WillFinn Teen AU
by Dave2380
Summary: AU where Will is the same age as Finn and Kurt. Rated M for eventual Winn, and for mentions of alcoholic/neglectful parents. Trigger warning for domestic abuse/mental illness/Postpartum depression. On Hiatus.
1. Chapter 1

It's not like Will doesn't know who Finn Hudson is, because he makes one hell of an impression, what with his height and his awkward gangliness, it helps that he's cute, with amazing chocolate brown eyes and dark hair that just begs to have your hands dragged through it.

But Will and Finn move in different circles, Finn hangs out with the jocks and Puckerman, holds court as the quarterback, even though they're just freshmen at McKinley. Will hangs out with Kurt Hummel and Tina Cohen- Chang and Artie Abrams, well he tries to, but what with having a pair of alcoholics as parents, doing all the chores at home and high school and joining the Cheerio's, well he's been kind of bad at the hanging out with his friends thing. Some days he's lucky if he even manages to catch lunch with them, because yeah life's kind of like that.

So yeah, there's this sort of awareness of Finn, but they've never actually talked. Will's pretty sure the taller teen doesn't even know his name. Not that he minds because okay the guy's hot, and Will has no problems thinking about other guys, hell he has no problem with getting with other guys as Justin and Jake the seniors on the Cheerio's would testify if anyone asked them. Not that anyone would, because what happens after winning Nationals in a hotel room, well it's never talked about outside of said hotel room.

But you have to date in High School, Will's pretty sure it's one of those unspoken rules of High School. So near the end of Freshman year he finally plucks up the nerve to ask beautiful blond Quinn Fabray if she wants to go out and see a movie with him. They're both cute and good looking, he's one of the Cheerio's best performers and she's Head Cheerleader. They'd make a cute couple, at least that's what Will thinks when he asks.

Quinn, to her credit doesn't laugh in his face. " Will, I'm flattered but I really just see you as a friend, besides I kind of have my eyes on someone else. " And her eyes drift across the football field towards the team as they run laps. Will nods as his mind figures out Quinn's reasoning. She's a people pleaser, she craves popularity, and she's the Head Cheerleader, so if she's going to be completely ruthless about gaining popularity and maintaining her reputation, well clearly she's going to go for the Quarterback.

Her eyes are downcast once she notices him noticing Finn. Who knows what she's expecting, anger, rejection, a massive hissy bitch fit ? She lets out a quick huff of breath as Will closes in for the briefest of hugs before he tilts her head up and winks at her. " It's okay Quinn. I can tell when I'm completely outclassed, but yeah I'm still here for you as a friend. You might want to ask him out though, the guy's kind of shy around girls. "

So yeah, he can't have Finn because he's a guy, a straight guy at that. Which never ends well. And Quinn wants to play the popularity game so she clearly won't be dating him. Still he did try, and word will get around that Quinn Fabray shot Will down, so at least people will know he's out there looking. Not that he really cares all that much about popularity but still it never hurts.

He just doesn't expect word to get to Finn, especially not when Will's changing after Cheerio's practice, because damn it he doesn't need the combination of a seriously cute guy and a shower and lots of naked flesh. So yeah he might have missed what Finn was actually saying the first time. Ok he definitely misses what Finn's saying because he's wondering just how chapped those lips really are…..

" Sorry, I kind of spaced, Finn right? " Will shrugs into his Bleach tee and sits down to pull on his socks and slip on his Converse. Finn just nods and grins before awkwardly rubbing the back of his neck. " So I heard from Puck, that Santana heard you asking Quinn out yesterday? I mean are you and Quinn like dating, cos she's like smoking' hot and if you guys are dating then I don't want to you know embarrass myself by asking her out. Cus that'd suck. " He blurts the words out and Will's just glad he's fluent in Spanish, because Finn's talking fast enough that it practically constitutes a foreign language.

When he manages to process Finn's high speed jumble he smiles and shakes his head, tying his sneakers and conveniently hiding his definitely inconvenient and conspicuous boner. " No I'm not dating Quinn. She's not into me at all, which sucks for me, but it's amazing for you dude. "

The taller guy's brows kind of furrow in puzzlement before he gets it. " Wait, she's like into me ? Sweet. " He grins before realizing what he's just said. " Uh not that she's not into you, cus yeah that has to totally suck, but, crap. I'm gonna shut up now. " He murmurs bashfully, before looking at Will with a what-can-I-say-that-won't-make-me-sound-like-a-complete-idiot look. Will just chuckles and holds out his fist for Finn to bump, which Finn does with the biggest grin, even going so far as to make explosion noises as they mime that part.

" Seriously, go get her man. " Will gestures vaguely outside, and it's a fucking relief when he bounds out like a happy hyperactive puppy and Will can just go hide in a restroom and get rid of the rather visible problem in his jeans…

The brief remainder of freshman year passes quickly enough except now he and Finn nod to each other and exchange brief greetings in the halls and Brittany decides that it's his turn to contribute to her record of making out with every guy in the school, which pretty soon turns into them dating.

Which doesn't exactly help him with his whole getting back in touch with his friends, because she takes up a lot of his time but Brittany's sweet and energetic and fun and it's definitely an interesting summer, even if he is chafing slightly by the end of it.

Interesting definitely covers it, that's for sure, his parents have another one of their drunken arguments and his dad burns down their house again, which sucks because this is the second house he's burned down when drunk and the insurance people are a freakin nightmare to deal with. Will's just glad he had the sense to buy a safety deposit box when he turned fourteen. Because getting duplicates of your birth certificate and social security stuff and everything is a nightmare. And now they have to move to a new house, which is a pain, but he lives three houses down from Kurt now so that's cool.

Being his neighbour and getting his help to redecorate their new house goes a long way towards thawing the chill between him and Kurt, and soon they're hanging out again watching Kurt's musicals or listening to the top 40 and singing along to anything that takes their fancy.

And Burt is just as awesome as ever, sort of squirrelly around Kurt, because of the huge glaring gay elephant in the room, which no one even thinks about it. Even if sometimes Kurt has this probing look, that evaluates Will, seems to seek him out and judge him. Will just lets it roll off of him, he knows who he is, he's comfortable with who he is, who he lusts after. Besides Kurt's not exactly being forthcoming about his own orientation so he leaves it alone for now. For now anyway.

Burt never pushes Will on his home life, not that he has to really, because half of Lima know about George Schuester and " Doodle " and their alcohol problems. Burt knows all about the gossip and the looks and how Will's had to be an adult since he was ten years old. Burt's seen Will exhausted from doing chores and running around town to pay bills and keeping his parents fed, and dealing with school on top of all this.

Not that there's much to be done, because yeah his parents are drunks, and kind of neglectful but they're better than nothing and it's not like foster care would be any better, besides he's like a week away from being sixteen so it's kind of pointless to change things now.

So he manages to reconnect with Kurt and Tina and Artie, even if it's not to the extent he hoped for, But it's a start. It's even better when he and Kurt turn sixteen within a week of each other. His gift to Kurt is a midnight blue silk scarf, it's not any of Kurt's preferred designers but the colour looks good on him and he positively jumps for joy. Burt and Kurt's gift to Will is a complete overhaul of the monstrosity of a car his parents bought him. It's a clunker with a dragging muffler, covered in rust spots when they start, but by the time they're finished it's the same shade of blue as Kurt's scarf, waxed and buffed to an inch of it's life and it purrs like a contented lion when Will turns the engine over. It's nothing like Kurt's amazing beast of a Navigator, which is possibly the finest car in town, but it's Will's and it's a step closer to getting the hell out of Lima.

So all in all things look kind of promising for Sophomore year. He's reconnected with his friends, his home life doesn't completely suck as much as it could and he has a hot cheerleader girlfriend. So yeah things are looking up.


	2. The beginning

The first day of Sophomore year is fine, Will and Kurt car-pool in to school, they find out their classes, commiserating over having gym together, smiling to each other because they're in Spanish together and they'll ace that, what with Will being fluent in Spanish and Kurt being a brain. They share English with Tina and Will has Math with Artie so that's cool. Brittany's sweet and attentive all day and even Coach Sylvester's " Welcome back, now-I'm going to do my best to break you down and build you up into champions speech " isn't so bad. Although her gruelling after school practice does make Will think she's putting a lot of emphasis on the breaking you down part rather than building them up.

Of course that's at school. Things go to hell when Will gets home, because his Mom is completely trashed on Vodka, which is never good. Because wine makes her giggly and she'll watch trashy soaps all day, and Tequila makes her bubbly and energetic, but drinking Vodka makes her angry and surly, bitterly resentful of her life. She screeches and hurls obscenities and gets in Will's face as soon as he gets in the door and he has to put up with her torrent of vitriolic abuse as he cooks dinner for their family, leaving his dads in the microwave oven before he finally manages to escape to his bedroom, where he locks himself in, texts his dad to let him know things have gone to hell again and does his homework.

He drowns out the noise of her screaming and pounding on his door with Skunk Anansie's greatest hits on repeat, drowning her rage with Skin's own rage. Countering his angry drunk mom with Clit-Rock. He finishes his homework and huddles on his bed, desperately wishing that he didn't have to deal with this shit. Hating how impotent, how powerless he feels. Wishing he could just be like any other sixteen year old kid and not have to be the only real adult in a house where he's barely even an adult legally.

He doesn't come out of his room until his dad knocks on the door. For once his dad is sober, because it doesn't help any of them when his moms like this and his dad drinks as well, and that's a fucking stab wound to the heart for Will, because if his Dad can stay sober when his mom's this bad, if he can do it now, for her, then why can't he do it for Will? Why can't he be the adult, why does Will have to deal with this shit if his dad can actually pull himself together?

His dad is the only one who manages to calm down his mom, and Will's left cleaning up her mess again, broken crockery and vases, torn curtains, another smashed television. All the work he and Kurt put into decorating his new home, trashed by his drunk of a mother.

It's how things are, and it sucks but it's his life and it's all he knows, so he cleans things up as usual. Dragging order out of chaos, wishing he had the words to tell his parents how much they're fucking him up, how lousy he feels, how powerless, wondering if this is what they feel like all the damn time, if this is why they drink.

But as usual he just nods tiredly to his dad when he asks if Will's okay and he's got this, because yeah he's got it. Even if he's far from okay. It's one in the morning when Will finishes everything, not just the tidying up, but unpacking the second set of dishes he bought when they moved, hanging new curtains, dealing with the laundry and getting all his stuff ready for school the next day. It's three in the morning by the time his brain finally gives in and shuts the fuck up and lets him get some sleep.

As usual his dad sleeps in the next day and Will has to call him in sick for the millionth time or however many it actually has been. He gets the hell out of the house because he can't cope with a remorseful hungover mother, just not today. He looks like hell, he feels like shit and the last thing he wants to do is go to school, but he sure as hell isn't sticking around for his folks to play happy families. Sure they may manage to stay sober for a few days, they might even look into AA meetings again, but it won't last, it never does. And he just can't take another three days or whatever of hope that's only going to flicker and fade as soon as his folks cave in and head to the liquor store.

So he bails, he heads to Kurt's an hour before they'd leave normally and lets Burt steer him to the Hummel's kitchen table like he's done a million times before, he lets him press a mug of his insanely strong coffee into his hands and make him breakfast. He lets Kurt go on and on about fashion and musicals, and none of the three of them mention the shouts that half the street heard, or the bags under Will's eyes, or the fact that he manages to drink three mugs of Burt's rocket fuel coffee before they leave .It's a fucked up version of normality, but he'll take it.

Inside the Navigator Kurt's already loading a cd into his sound system, one of Will's mix discs of Nirvana and the Foo Fighters and classic rap that normally Kurt wouldn't even allow into his Baby, let alone play, but this too is part of their routine.

Kurt grimaces as Smells like teen spirit blares out of his speakers and despite Burt's coffee Will still finds himself dozing as they head towards school.

It's only fifteen minutes or so but the rest helps Will, a lot. He still feels completely wiped out but he can deal with it, he only stops for like a minute to tie his laces, but Kurt doesn't notice and just heads across the parking lot. So Will has to run to catch up, and that's when he see's Puckerman and a couple of the jocks hoisting Kurt into a dumpster as Finn Hudson stands there holding Kurt's bag and his new Marc Jacobs coat and just watches.

All thoughts of feeling like shit, every trace of weariness is just gone as Will runs over to the dumpster to help Kurt out, and only after he's sure Kurt's better and after his bag and coat are handed to him by Finn, who wont even look them in the eyes, either of them.

Well that's when Will snaps and throws a right hook at Finn fucking Hudson, he looks shocked, and surprised before he's knocked flat on his ass by the punch. Finn's hand comes up to his jaw and he throws a hurt look at Will. " Dude, what the fuck ? "

" What do you mean, what the fuck, you let your idiot jock friends toss Kurt into the fucking trash, like he's garbage or something, and you wonder why I'm going to fucking punch you ? What kind of fucking asshole are you ? Do you get some sick kick out of watching them pick on someone half their fucking size ? "

Finn can't look into Will's eyes as those grey green eyes fucking burn into him. He looks away as he stands up and shakes his head. " Dude… "

Will just shakes his head before he talks over Finn drowning out whatever lame ass excuse he's going to try and feed him. " Whatever, you know I thought you were cool. I thought you were kind of a decent guy, but you're not, you're just another fucking disappointment. You're the fucking quarterback, you're like the most popular guy in this piece of shit school, all it'd take from you is one fucking word. " No. " Two little letters and those meatheads would leave him alone. Seriously, I really thought you were better than that. "

Will steers Kurt past Finn and heads for the main entrance, only to have a large, heavy and oh so warm hand clamp on his shoulder. " It's not that I want to, it's just…."

Will brushes Finn's hand off his shoulder. " It's just that you're too fucking spineless to stop them picking on Kurt, on a kid who still looks like he's twelve. Don't touch me, and stay the hell away from Kurt or I swear next time I won't stop at one punch. " Will fixes his eyes on Finn's for emphasis, glaring at him until the quarterback flinches. " Are we clear ? "

Finn nods, not daring to look at Will as he mutters, " Yeah, sure. "

Kurt doesn't really talk until they're in Spanish in third period. " You didn't have to do that, now the jocks will come after you. I can handle it Will, it's not that big a deal. " Kurt murmurs when they're supposed to be conjugating verbs. Will looks up and meets Kurt's gaze. " It is a big deal, you're my best friend, I've known you since kindergarten and you want me to just ignore when people toss you into trash, like you're garbage? Yeah like I'm going to let that slide. Why didn't you tell me about this shit ? "

Kurt's eyes blaze for a moment before he takes a deep breath and exhales. " You weren't around, you were busy being a Cheerio. And you have your own problems, you shouldn't have to deal with mine as well." He shrugs, trying to brush it off but Will isn't giving in.

" Look I'm sorry I wasn't there for you, but we're friends and I'm damned if I'll let anyone treat you like that. I can deal with my problems, hell you've been helping me deal with them since we were ten years old, so I'm not giving up. I swear if I have to beat the crap out of the entire fucking football team I will, because you don't deserve this shit. " He reaches across his desk and squeezes Kurt's shoulder briefly before they return to their work.

It's lunch when they hear about Sandy Ryerson getting fired for fondling Hank Saunders. Tina and Kurt immediately start gossiping about it, wondering if he'd fondled any of the other students. Will and Artie just share a grin and roll their eyes at their friends.

" So any idea who's taking over glee, I mean if Ryerson's out then that's pretty much it. " Muses Will.

" You're not thinking of joining are you ? " Artie asks.

" I dunno, I mean if it doesn't conflict with Cheerio's I don't see why not. I can sing and dance, and I know Kurt and Tina can sing, besides Artie you're not half bad either."

" Of course we can sing, but it's rather pointless if there's not even a glee club. If someone takes it over then I guess I could join. Provided we get input regarding our costumes, because I refuse to let anyone fashion challenged choose my costume, thank you very much. " Sniffs Kurt with a disdainful glare around the cafeteria. " Seriously, look how half these people dress. "

Tina giggles and Kurt's icy mask shifts as he chuckles.

Which is pretty much as far as the conversation goes until Thursday when Will sees a sign up sheet for New Direction's and hears that Miss Holliday has taken over glee club. So he signs his name and tells the others and they all sign up.

They're not alone, Mercedes Jones is there, Will had Chemistry with her last year, she's sassy and fierce and he's pretty sure that if Kurt ever does out himself that Mercedes would be the ultimate fag hag. And yeah, Rachel Berry's there too, with her weird animal knitwear sweaters and short skirt fashion combos that practically make Kurt foam at the mouth. Will has to admit though that the girl can sing. Ok so he's not the greatest fan of Les Mis but she kills On My Own. Mercedes is amazing as she belts out Respect. Kurt's slightly sad and melancholic with Mr Cellophane. Tina does I kissed a girl and manages a great rendition of it. Artie does a pretty energetic version of Pretty Fly For A White Guy.

Of course then it's Will's turn. Kurt bitched at him for hours trying for something from Broadway, while Will argued in favour of classic rock. Until the two of them tried glaring each other into submission and they hit itunes looking for something that Kurt wouldn't cut him for singing.

The music starts up behind him and Will just let's the music take him, up and out and just away….

"She said I love you boy,

I love your soul,

She said I love you baby, oh, oh, oh, ohh.

She said I love you more than words can say,

She said I love you bayayayayabayy.

So I said, what you sayin girl it can't be right,

How can you be in love with me,

We only just met tonight.

So she said…Boy I loved you from the start,

When I first heard Love goes down,

Something started burning in my heart.

I said stop this crazy talk,

And leave right now and close the door,

She said but I love you boy I love you so,

She said I love you baby oh, oh, oh.

She said I love you more than words can say,

She said I love you bayayayayby (yes you did)

So now up in the Courts

Pleading my case from the witness box,

Telling the judge and the jury,

The same thing that I said to the cops,

On the day that I got arrested,

I'm innocent I protested,

She just feels rejected,

Had her heart broken by someone she's obsessed with,

Cos she likes the sound of my music,

Which makes her a fan of my music

That's why Love goes down makes her lose it,

Cos she can't separate the man from the music,

And I'm saying this in the stand,

As my girl cries tears from the galleries,

Got bigger than I ever could have planned,

Like that song by the Zuton's Valerie,

So the jury don't look like they're buying it,

And it's making me nervous,

Arms crossed, screw faced like I'm trying it,

Their eyes fixed on me like a murderers.

They wanna lock me up,

And throw away the key,

They wanna send me down,

Even though I told them she….

She said I love you boy,

I love your soul,

She said I love you baby, oh, oh ,oh, oh (yes you did )

She said I love you more than words can say,

She said I love you bayayayayby.

So I said, why the hell you gotta treat me this way,

You don't know what love is,

You wouldn't do this if you did,

Oh , no, no, no, noo,

Mmmmmmm."

He comes back to himself to see Miss Holliday nodding in approval, along with the others. So okay his life might suck but at least he can manage this.

He's putting away the books he doesn't need and closing his locker only to have Rachel Berry just sort of appear out of nowhere with kind of a manic look on her face.

" You are really good. " She smiles up at him, her big dark eyes highlighted by her lashes. Oh dear gods I she like flirting ? " Uh thanks. " She takes one deliberate step forward and she's got this really crazed look on her face.

" Will, I haven't seen you all day. " Squeals Brittany as she pounces on him from behind and giggly spins him away from Rachel. He utters a silent prayer to whatever god is responsible for his girlfriend showing up before he's pressed up against a locker and she's full on making out with him in the hallway. " I I'll see you around Will. " He hears Rachel blurt out as she hurries off.

Brittany giggles as she pulls back slightly. " She's weird, she had this look on her face like you were a cookie and she was hungry. And I don't share, unless it's with Santana. " Brittany frowns as she remembers Rachel's words, " When's she going to see you, wait she didn't get on the team did she, that would be weirder than my cat reading my diary. " Brittany's hands slip into Will's back pockets as she nuzzles his neck.

" I joined the glee club, she's in it. She can sing, but she's really, really bossy. " Will breathed as Brittany worked on his neck. She chuckled against his skin before coming up for air. " Glee club, that's lame. " Her hands migrated from Will's ass and slid under his t-shirt. He hissed as she lightly scratched him before pulling away.

" I thought you liked me singing Britt. "

" Only to me, it's like special. "

" I can still sing just for you. " He smiled at her and she beamed happily.

" Oh, that's okay then. See you tomorrow? " She didn't even wait for his answer before she spun away from him gracefully and bounced happily down the hallway.

The last thing Will expected to find at their next glee rehearsal was an extremely nervous and almost terrified Finn Hudson, of course Will could kind of get his terror, because if he was being backed against a piano by Rachel, well he'd have that exact same look of terror on his face.

He was kind of torn between enjoying the jocks discomfort and helping him out, he looked across to Kurt, who was currently gossiping with Tina and Mercedes about concealer, and sighed. This was such a bad idea. He walked up to the piano and intervened.

" Excuse me Rachel, I need a word with Finn. "

" Oh sure Will. " She backed off, still with that kind of manic look on her face. Finn eyed him warily, unsure what to say. " Dude, you're not gonna like punch me again right? "

" Not if you keep your goons away from Kurt."

" They're not like my goons, I , look I can't tell them what to do. I don't like it, but I'm kinda stuck. " He looked at Will and shrugged helplessly. Will rolled his eyes. " How do you know if you never try ? Oh yeah, and don't ever let Rachel back you into a corner, she's got that whole Swimfan vibe going on. "

Will chuckled at the look of sheer panic on Finn's face as he picked a seat behind Kurt. " Are you still threatening to break his legs if his goons bother me ? " Murmured Kurt. Will snickered, " No, just giving him a Rachel-vention, he obviously didn't get the memo. "

Kurt pulled out his compact and flicked it open, checking for blemishes. " Good, because if he's going to be a part of glee then he's going to have to be able to dance. " Kurt glared at Will via the mirror. " Fine ok I won't break his legs, I'll just get Mercedes to cut him. " Mercedes and Tina turned to Will at that and both started giggling.

It's Artie that pulls Will to the side a couple of days later. " He saved me from being dunked in a port-a-potty, I think he really wants to be one of us, and I get that things with Kurt and the jocks are kind of shitty. But give him a chance? "

And because it's Artie, and Artie's like the voice of reason, Will nods. " Okay I'll give him a fresh start, but if he messes up then I swear he's going to be in for a world of hurt. "

Artie smirks, " And broken feet." before he fist bumps Will.


	3. Why it's so important

Will Schuester's kind of confusing. Finn kind of knows him , he's one of those people you see but don't talk to. He's Finn's age, and used to live close to Puck, like in fifth grade or something and Finn has hazy recollections of a kid with curly hair and green eyes at Middle school that might have been him.

So yeah he sees him from time to time in Freshman year, but they don't really have any classes, except for Spanish which Finn sucks at, and Will is completely amazing at. He's like a student and he's corrected substitute teachers when they've been in. Finn doesn't quite get why Will would take Spanish if he can already speak it.

So yeah Will's on the Cheerio's and his friends, well they don't suck, Tina Cohen-Chang has a stutter but she's kinda cool and Finn digs the streaks in her hair, and Artie Abrams plays a mean guitar, he's like better than Puck sometimes. The Hummel kid, well he's just plain weird with those really tight jeans and fussy designer sweaters, and yeah okay Finn isn't completely okay with the dumpster tosses but it's what happens in High School, so he just goes with it.

And he kind of notices things, like those T-shirts Will likes, they're all Bleach anime ones, and once Finn finds the fan subs, well he kind of gets into it, even if anyone finding out would label him a geek or a nerd. He likes Nirvana and classic rap, and the Foo fighters and obscure soft rock and stuff, because he argues with Hummel in the hallways and bitches the weird kid out about Broadway, not even a little scared by the kids bitch face. Which is like almost as scary as that evil grin Puck has.

He doesn't drink much either, never more than two or three beers at parties, and if anyone ever calls him on it he just shrugs and laughs it off. He's, well Finn doesn't know what he is, hell he doesn't even know why he keeps noticing these things about a guy he's never talked to.

Of course there's gossip, because he's a Cheerio, one of like six guys on the squad, and the Football team rag on those guys all the time calling them fags and shit, but there's like serious gossip that Schuester had a threeway with two seniors when they were at Nationals, and Finn only heard that because he was hanging around under the bleachers waiting for Cheerio practice to end so he could maybe, kind of, sorta ask out Quinn Fabray. He heard Santana and Brittany giggling and gossiping but those two are always saying weird stuff.

And then he heard that Schuester asked out Quinn, and then it seemed even less likely, cus gay guys don't ask chicks out, right? But that thought, the thought of Will and Quinn dating, sent Finn into a total panic, because fuck, what if he'd waited too long and Quinn was dating this dude ?

Which is why he actually talks to Will the first time. And yeah the dude does kind of space out on him for a second, but he's just out of the shower and getting dressed and stuff, and even Finn spaces out like that sometimes when you have like seventeen different thoughts all at once.

There's this huge surge of relief that Will and Quinn aren't dating, and then of course he kind of feels bad for the other guy, because man being shot down for someone else has gotta suck, but Will's kind of fine with that, and he wouldn't say it if it wasn't true. And when Finn looks into his eyes he doesn't see anything other than a guy telling him to go after the girl he wants.

So yeah he starts dating Quinn, and hears that Will's dating Brittany, and he feels something, but he doesn't know what, it's like nothing he's ever felt before, so he just lets it go, because if he doesn't know what it is then it can't be that important.

That's when they start saying hi, or nodding to each other in the hallways, and Finn thinks he could actually like the guy, maybe hang out with him sometime. Then it's summer and he's with Quinn and it's like awesome, because, you know, boobs, and making out. Awesome.

Summer is awesome, but outside of school he notices stuff, like he sees Will on Fridays jogging around town and paying bills and stuff, and doing stuff at the bank. Which is weird, cus that's what parents are for right?

Finn's mom does all the stuff with Bills, and grocery shopping and chores, and then Finn hears from Quinn, who hears from Santana, who hears from Brittany that Will's always back at his place making dinner for his folks, which is you know backwards right ? Your folks are meant to look after you.

Lima's not all that big, it's not like a city or anything, so there's gossip and stuff, Finn's never paid attention to most of it, but when he starts wondering what's up with Will, well Quinn sort of looks at him as if he can't possibly be that dumb, and then completely clams up on the subject. Turns out that she might not be dating Will but they're kind of friends and she doesn't dish the dirt on her real friends.

Santana does though, but she won't do it around Brittany, and Finn has to take her on a killer McDonalds run before she spills the gossip about Will's folks being drunks and him being the only grown up in the bunch of them since he was like ten or something, she tells him all the rumours about Will's parents, about them getting drunk and burning down two houses now, cus Will's moved into a house near the Hummel kid. He passes it off as learning about the competition, cus Santana knows about Will asking Quinn out, and she buys it. Well she acts like she does, and she got like four happy meals out of it, so everyone wins.

Apart from Will, because Finn can't even imagine having to act like an adult when you're like ten, hell he can't even make grilled cheese without a George Foreman grill, because he's pretty much banned from ever going near the oven after he tried using it to dry out his sneakers.

Having to run a house from age ten because your folks are serious alcoholics, well that just blows his fucking mind. Not that he thinks about it a lot, not that it keeps him up some nights, just with the sheer thought of how wrong it is. No kid deserves that. He's damn sure that Will needs all the friends he can get and he thinks he'll try and hang out with him this year at school.

Which doesn't really happen because now Will carpools in with Kurt, and no one messed with Hummel on the first day back, cus everyone has to get their shit together. But on the second day Hummel gets dumpster tossed and Finn waits with the kids coat and bag as usual cus it's all he can do, he can't go against the system or they'll beat the crap out of him. So it's a compromise, well in his head anyway cus Hummel always gives him a bitch face in return.

Hummel sure as fuck doesn't punch him with a mean right hook that knocks him on his ass, and he definitely doesn't get in Finn's face, calling him a disappointment and making him feel like shit. Because even though Will looks lousy, like he didn't sleep and he's been crying or whatever, he just blazes, he's so angry and it makes Finn feel shitty and ashamed and two inches tall.

Because maybe he's right, maybe telling the guys No, maybe it'd be enough. And he probably shouldn't have tried to explain himself, because hearing Will tell him not to touch him like that, like Finn was something nasty that needed scraping off his shoe, and that look, well it makes Finn feel like he is something nasty to be scraped off someone's boot. When he bruises on his jaw, he just accepts it, cus Will had a point, he should be better than this.

He hears them talking in Spanish, in third period, neither Hummel nor Will have a problem with the class, they're smart, but Finn doesn't get it at all, verbs and tenses and stuff, it may as well go in one ear and out the other, but hearing Will seriously telling Kurt he'll beat the crap out of the whole football team if he has to, in that grim, no bullshit tone of voice. It lets Finn know that this stuff is serious, he's never thought of it before but throwing someone in a dumpster, that's like saying that they're garbage. He doesn't like that thought at all.

Will doesn't nod at him in the hallways for the next few days, he kind of glares, and in the mornings he manages to get Hummel past the dumpsters without anything happening. Finn doesn't know how he manages it until he remembers that Will broke Puck's arm in sixth grade when Puck was being a douche.

So, Puck won't mess with Hummel if Will's there, which is kind of a relief, because now Finn doesn't have to do anything about it. Of course he still has to study, which sucks, because his grades are lousy and he's going to flunk out soon, and if that happens he'll be off the team and won't get a football scholarship and end up pumping gas for a living.

It's Spanish class that gives him an out, Miss Holliday pulls him aside after class one day and tells him he's going to flunk out. She tells him that there's not a lot she can do, maybe she could give him extra credit or something but he's not great with the subject matter. He's just about to beg her not to flunk him, to ask if there's anything he can do, anything, when something clicks in his brain and he remembers she's taken over the glee club.

Okay so maybe he watched the auditions after school, because he heard Will and his friends in the cafeteria a few days back, and yeah they were all kind of good, well really good if he's honest. Even if Hummel's song made him really sad, but Will, well, Will blew him away with that song he performed. He was so good that Finn might have actually downloaded it to his ipod when he got home.

So he asks Miss Holliday if he could join glee club and translate that into extra credit. She lets him and it's a fucking weight off his mind. Sure he gets some shit off Puck for it and the bastard paintballs him, but it's important, because he can sing, and he enjoys it, and yeah okay doing it means his Spanish teacher won't flunk him and destroy his life.

So okay the guys give him shit about being a loser and he has to stop them from flipping Artie in a port-a-potty, but when Will saves him from that Rachel chick it's totally worth it, even if Finn is positive that Hummel, Mercedes and Tina are laughing at him.

But at least Will's not actively hating him, and when he hears Artie and Will in the hallways after practice and Will agrees to give him a chance, well he does a little victory dance.

He just wishes he knew why it was so important that Will likes him?


	4. The Wrath of Sue

Sue Sylvester is some sort of tyrant. It's not an unfamiliar thought for Will, especially on these mandatory before school practices she randomly springs on the squad. She works them hard, and getting through the rest of the day is a bitch but it gives the squad a chance to gossip during practice. Well, Santana and Brittany gossip. Will and Quinn chat.

Because yes she may have shot him down in flames in favour of Finn, but once you remove the issue of dating and sex, well she's surprisingly easy to talk to. Even if she is insanely obsessed with popularity and status.

" I can't believe you joined glee. " She mutters as they jog. Taking great care not to show how pissed off she is with Sue's latest idea of having the squad run three miles before they can shower. Will just shrugs it off, he likes to run, well he likes exercise in general, mostly because it gives him yet another reason to get out of the house.

" Yes Quinn, you said, and so did Santana, and Brittany and half the squad, but I like singing, I like performing, and it doesn't conflict with Cheerio's. Besides I don't give a damn, worrying about popularity and status is pointless. " He shoots a quick glance at Quinn, and yup she's frowning,

" This is high school, if you're not popular then you are nothing. Do you honestly not care if you get Slushied or tossed in a dumpster, just because you like to sing. Everyone will think you're gay. "

" Like they don't already ? I'm a guy and I'm a cheerleader. They've been calling me a fag since I joined, people are always going to run their damn mouths. Besides I'll only be Slushied or dumpster tossed once, because I will completely annihilate whoever does it. The last guy who pissed me off ended up flat on his ass after one punch. " Will can't help flashing a cocky grin at this.

" Yes, I know, and that bruise on Finn's face still hasn't completely faded. Honestly I understand you want to look out for the Hummel kid, but did you have to punch him ? " She tries to glare at him, only to sigh in frustration as he arches an eyebrow at her.

" Kurt, that's his name, is off limits. Anyone who tries anything is going to have an appointment with my fist. Just because he's a little different doesn't mean it's ok to pick on him. And until people get the point I'm going to watch his back. "

" Different, Will he's a complete flamer, he should be banned from aerosol products in case they ignite. He's practically the love child of Liberace and Elton John. " Quinn manages to force the words out as they finally finish their 3 miles. She comes to a halt, panting and glaring at the ground.

Will's not quite so tired , but he's not done with this conversation yet. " Ok, so Kurt's a little camp, but until he says he's gay, until he admits it, well he's just a little different. And if he does come out, I'll still kick the crap out of anyone who messes with him. "

Quinn's lips purse slightly, " Solidarity? "

Will rolls his eyes, " Friendship, I'm not gay Quinn. Don't get me wrong I like guys, but I like girls too, and Brittany is amazing, she's sweet and funny and the girl can kiss. So yeah, maybe a little solidarity, but it's mostly Friendship. "

Quinn's expression is thoughtful, as if she's actually thinking and not reacting. " You've never admitted it before. The squad don't know for sure about you and the guys at Nationals, but there was some speculation. But I think this is the first time you've ever actually said that you're bisexual. "

She's right, even though he's been ok, hell even dismissive of his orientation, he's never actually felt the need to come out and say anything about it. " I haven't have I ? I just don't see why it's such a big deal, plus it's no one else's business. So yeah, I'm bisexual or whatever, the important thing is I'm okay with it. Plus I beat Puckerman to that threeway he's always wanted. "

Quinn snickers for a moment before shoving him away slightly making an exaggerated Ew face. And just like that, that faint sense of tension between them vanishes, almost as if it never existed in the first place.

Being summoned into Sue's presence isn't uncommon, Will's pretty sure she thinks she's god or something, but for all her weirdness she does get results. She drives the squad hard, to the point where Will doesn't have to worry about anything other than getting routines right, to the point where the world sharpens and narrows to those steps, or that triple flip that took forever to pull off.

The look on Sue's face however is never good, it's her trademark malevolent glare that she uses on people who she's about to mess with, and Will really hoped he would never see that look aimed at him. Because while he respects Sue and admires her drive, well he doesn't let anyone walk over him. Ever. It's Rule Number One, do not let anyone make you do anything you don't want to.

So when she slides a piece of paper across her desk and a pen, still wearing that smirk on her face, Will knows this is just not going to end well. And when he actually reads it, finding out that it's an agreement to quit glee club in perpetuity in exchange for being allowed to remain on the Cheerio's ? That pisses him off considerably, especially as he didn't even get a chance to shower before being summoned.

He knows Sue has some sort of weird , creepy, vindictive animosity towards Miss Holliday. They've been glaring at each other ever since the glee club was reformed and there are rumours that there's some unholy war between them brewing, mind you there are also rumours that Miss Holliday was Sue's lesbian lover and dumped her. Which is a little unlikely but Will tries to keep an open mind.

He looks up at her and she's watching him intently, looking for any sign of weakness. He takes a deep breath and rips the paper in half lengthwise before fixing his gaze on Sue and firmly shaking his head.

" I'm not even asking why, I know there's this thing between you and Miss Holliday. I'm not even mad that you were going to " Allow " me to keep my position on the squad, as if I wasn't one of your best performers. What really pisses me off is the fact that you thought you could force me to do anything. I don't do ultimatums and you know it. So did you honestly think I'd sign your little piece of paper ? " He forces himself to remain calm, blowing up at Sue with no reason won't help anyone.

" Yes, William. I did expect you to sign my little piece of paper. I will not have that woman taking one of my best performers, you want to shine, you want your time in the spotlight, I get that, I'm even willing to help you achieve it, but it comes with a price, because if you're with her, then you won't be with me. "

Will's beginning to think the lesbian rumour might actually be true, the sheer amount of vindictive venom in Sue's voice is staggering, it's almost toxic, malevolent. " I respect you Sue, I may not like the way you do things, but I'm not quitting glee, and even trying to force me like you did, well that made things a whole lot easier. You can be as manipulative and controlling as you want, but as of now, I am out. You just lost one of your best performers, you'll have my uniform tomorrow. "

He stands up to leave, only to feel a hand on his shoulder and damn it, people have really got to stop doing that to him. " William, think about this, are you really willing to leave my squad and join those mouth breathers in glee over something so trivial ? Do you really want to be my opponent. " Her voice is low and he can tell she gets just how much she's fucked up, but her pride is the size of Texas and there's no way she'll back down. It's kind of a shame no one told her about Rule Two: Never back down, so he has no option either.

He turns and for a second there's a flicker of doubt across her face, before that mask of hers slides into place. " I'd rather be somewhere where I am appreciated, you were going to "allow" me to remain on your squad when only Brittany, Santana and Quinn are better than I am. You don't get to say what I can and can't do, no one does. No one makes me do anything Sue, I thought you got that, but evidently you don't. You brought this upon yourself. You may know how to wow a panel of judges, but your social skills kind of suck. See you around Coach. "

She turns away and he leaves, heading to the locker room to shower and change before school.

Sue really doesn't take rejection well. By second period the word is out, the Cheerio's are forbidden to talk to Will. Quinn shuns him in the hallways, Santana has to drag Brittany past him when they pass, his cute blond girlfriend's eyes are locked on his as her friend pulls her away.

The jocks think they have a perfect opportunity to bring him down a peg or two, Azimio Slushies him outside the cafeteria, only to have Will's fist lash out into his liver in a textbook move that makes the bulky jock double over and blow chunks. Karofsky ushers his stricken friend away, flashing a look at Will that's equal parts fear and the desire to try punching Will in retaliation.

It's after Will finally gets the last of the damn Slushie out of his hair and changes into his baggy unflattering sweats, cursing the fact that his white Bankai Ichigo shirt is tinted blue and wondering if Kurt can get the blue crud out of it, that he runs into Brittany in the halls.

She's a mess, her ponytail's coming undone, her uniform's all rumpled and she's been crying, her eyes are red and puffy and she just throws herself into his arms and sobs.

" Britt, babe, what's wrong. " She snuffles against his hoodie and mumbles something utterly incoherent before she pulls herself together and looks up at him.

" I, I have to break up with you, Coach said if I don't, if I don't do it, she'll cut me from the team and, I don't want to , but I , I just can't not be on the team. I'm not smart like you Will, I know people think I'm dumb, but I can dance, and being on the team, it, it…"

Will hugs her tightly, knowing how this ends. Brittany's right, she's not book smart. Her grades are borderline terrible, but being on a Cheerleading team that's taken five National titles will get her into dance programs, will get her the hell out of Lima and onstage, where she can dance, where she can shine. Knowing this still doesn't stop Will's heart from skipping a beat, doesn't make it any easier to look into her red rimmed eyes and know this is it, that they are over. That when this hug ends, when her arms aren't crushing him to her so hard it's beginning to hurt, when he can't feel her frantic heartbeat trying to hammer it's way out of her chest, that she won't be his anymore.

She breaks the eye contact to lean in and kiss him, and it's slow and sweet and if kisses were words or speeches or soliloquy's then this would be an epic of loss, a wrenching tug of reluctant goodbye. It's nothing like any kiss they've ever shared before, not her deep hungry ones before she jumps into his arms, or the frantic ones she bestows upon him during sex, or even her happy enthusiastic Hi kisses that saved him from Rachel.

This one is an ending and when they stop kissing and pull back, she's not the only one crying as they both walk away.

He doesn't cook that night at home, his parents are in their third day of sobriety, still trying for a semblance of the happy family, they order take out and watch movies from the eighties. It could almost be normal, but it's nowhere near normal, because the atmosphere's brittle and fake. It's almost cloying and he heads to his room as soon as he can under the excuse of doing his homework.

Not that his mother even notices, curled up on their couch with his dad, snuggling, making googly eyes at him. She could almost be normal, but they're not, none of them are. His mom's a drunk, his dad's barely functional and Will just knows he's about nineteen different kinds of messed up himself.

He buries himself in the Season 3 box-set of Bleach, letting the original Japanese voice actors soothe away all his thoughts, he loses himself in the conflict of the Gotei 13 and Ichigo and Aizen and all the plot twists until he finally drifts off sometime before Aizen and his cohorts are saved by the Menos Grande and exit to Hueco Mundo.

He wakes up around midnight when someone's pulling a blanket over him. His dad flinches slightly as he realises he's woken Will up, but relaxes and just sits on the edge of the bed. He's uncomfortable and nervous, probably remembering that he hasn't had a proper conversation with Will since he had to keep his shit together for the insurance people, since Will pretty much glared him into staying sober at least until the paperwork was filled in. Probably remembering how he headed straight to the nearest liquor store afterwards and couldn't look Will in the face when he came back to their hotel with a bag full of clinking bottles.

" Are you ok ? " It's not profound or a great opening line, but it's a start. How long has it been since he's actually tried to reach out, to talk to his son ? Will can't remember a time when he's heard those words without his mom being in his dads arms, all of George's attention fixed on Dorothy as he asks Will if he's okay. If he's okay to clean up the latest mess, the latest damage. If he can take care of everything.

" No. I'm not okay. My girlfriend dumped me. I quit the Cheerio's and the Coach made her dump me, just because I pissed her off. " His voice is purposely monotone, because he can't voice the emotion, because it'll make it even more real, even more painful and intense.

" Can she do that ? " His father's voice is soft, low, comforting. It makes Will's eyes prickle, because he's needed his dad so many times, and now, now when he's sixteen, when he shouldn't need him, now he's taking an interest. It's so unfair and it can't last, because it never does and he hates himself for the hope that blooms in his chest, that maybe this time, he'll actually see that Will needs him and actually be there.

" It's Sue Sylvester, she could get away with murder, I stood up to her so she had to slap me down. It's how she operates. I chose the glee club over the Cheerio's so she took away my girlfriend. If Brittany was cut from the team she'd never get into Juilliard, so I just let her dump me and walk away. "

His dad nods and sighs, " That's very adult of you Will. I'm sorry you had to do that. "

Will snorts, " I've had six years of being an adult, nice to know the practice was good for something. " Emotions flicker across his dads face, hurt, shame, guilt, regret, sorrow. It's like he's seeing inside his dad for a second. Seeing a man, who's weak and clueless and powerless and just has no damn idea what to do, or say, or how to act. A man whose only solace is the Scotch that numbs him, that takes away all the pain.

" Will, I…."

" You should go check on mom, she'll be wondering where you are. " Will cuts him off, it's petty and cruel but he just can't deal with this right now. And as his dad heads out of the room he turns away from the door and buries his head beneath the pillow and just wishes everything would just fade away.

They have to do an assembly in front of the school, and Holly Holliday is frankly insane, because who in their right mind would allow Rachel Berry to pick a number to make glee club look sexy, and seriously, Push it ? Will is seriously wondering if Holly's been buying pot from Ryerson, who's hanging around the school grounds in complete creeper-fondler fashion.

So it's no real surprise that Figgins has complaints and song restrictions and Kurt's blushing like a tomato because he knows Will is going to ruthlessly interrogate him as to why he felt the need to slap Finn's ass in front of the whole school. And yeah he mercilessly teases Kurt about it before laughing it off and relegating it to that corner of his mind labelled " Kurt's big gay elephant in the room to be discussed if he ever actually comes out. "

What is a surprise is finding Quinn, Santana and Brittany auditioning in the choir room. None of them can even look at Will, so he knows this is some scheme of Sue's to destroy them all. Not that Holly believes him, thinking he's paranoid because of his " being cut " from the Cheerio's and his now extremely public break up with Brittany. Thank you Jacob Ben Israel for blogging it to the whole damn school. That's the last time Will actually does anything remotely nice for the creepy little gossipmonger.

So yeah, Sue's up to something and Will's waiting for the other shoe to drop.

He doesn't want to go home, he's not sure what worries him more, his folks drinking again or his dad actually engaging with him, taking an interest. So he does what he always does, he works out, he's working the heavy bag in the weights room, beating the shit out of the bag, pummelling it with his fists, throwing in the occasional roundhouse kick for good measure.

The bag's as beaten as a bag can be when Finn finds him panting, doubled over, his t-shirt hanging from the waistband of his shorts, soaked with sweat, his curls plastered to his scalp, balanced on that thin line between giddy exhaustion and the endorphin high of a seriously good workout.

" I think it's dead. " Finn murmurs. Will looks over his shoulder and smirks.

" Put up a good fight though. "

" It must be dumber than me, cus I sure as hell wouldn't be volunteering to let you slug me again. "

" I punched you once, and you totally deserved it. Besides Quinn bitched me out for it. " Will shrugged, wiping the sweat from his face with his soaked shirt, not noticing the way Finn's eyes tracked the movement of his muscles, the planes of his shoulders, the toned six pack, the defined line of muscle near the hips.

" So yeah, what do you want Finn ? " Will tucked his soiled tee back into his waistband and rolled his shoulders, working out a kink in his left shoulder.

" I uh, I kinda wanted to ask if you were okay, I know Quinn and the others are like avoiding you and Brittany broke up with you which sucks, but I dunno if anyone's asking if you're okay."

Will grimaced as he heard that word again, wincing as a particularly stubborn knot of tension twinged. " I'll deal with it. Sue will get bored eventually, she'll find someone more entertaining to harass. "

" Dude, seriously you're never gonna work that knot out yourself, sit down and let me take a look at it. "

Will sighed and headed to the nearest bench, sitting astride it, shuddering slightly as he felt Finn settle behind him, a mass of warmth behind him. " Dude sit still, or it'll take forever. " He heard the quarterback mutter as his hands settled on Will's shoulders, rough, calloused fingers skimming across his skin until they found the knots of tension and began kneading them into submission. Finn's breath ghosted across the back of Will's neck and he shivered, breaking out in goosebumps as the warm air drifted across his sensitive neck.

Finn chuckled, " Dude are you ticklish ? "

" Sensitive, but not ticklish. " Hissed Will as one particularly stubborn knot resisted Finn's magic fingers. It was really relaxing, " You're kind of good at this. "

" Puck says that too, dude usually falls asleep on me after practice if I do this. His shoulders are a freakin' nightmare after practice. "

" He's an asshole. I don't know what his problem is but he's been a dick since fifth grade. "

" Dude, you broke his arm. "

" He was picking on Artie after his accident, his first day back at school and Puckerman asks if he's the bionic man? He had it coming. "

" Oh, yeah that's not cool, he totally deserved it." Finn frowned and pushed down firmly with his fingers and the last knot of tension faded away. Will sighed in relief and sagged gently.

" Didn't know I was so sore till it was gone, thanks man I owe you one. " He stood up and headed for the changing rooms, Finn following in his wake absently. " Well, I kind of suck at Spanish, I could use some help, Miss Holliday won't fail me as long as I'm in glee but I really need help. " He shrugged, watching as Will opened his locker and fished out his shampoo and shower gel. " Yeah sure, Spanish is a breeze, you busy tomorrow? I'd say tonight but you probably have plans and we have glee on Thursdays so tomorrow would be cool."

Will wrapped a towel round his waist and slipped out of his shorts and briefs, vanishing into the shower stalls as Finn waited on the bench. " I'm not busy tonight, I have a date tomorrow night so tonight would be cool."

" Okay, you want to write down your address, I'll swing by around seven and see what I can do. "

" I can come to your place if it's better ? "

Will paused in the shower stall, gnawing his lip in thought, " No, I think your place would be better, my folks want the house to themselves, sort of a date night thing. " The lie rolls smoothly off his tongue. It sure as hell beats the truth, that Will's not sure if his folks would even be sober, it's easier just to edit the truth slightly than have to explain his home life to a casual acquaintance.

Finn doesn't seem perturbed by this, " Okay cool, I'm just gonna leave my address on the bench, catch you later dude. "

And then he's gone.


	5. Balls of steel

Finn isn't gay, no, no sir, not him. He likes sports and beer and girls and especially boobs, and making out with girls is completely amazing, it has to be amazing because he's got kind of a problem with, well with arriving early, which is really embarrassing but fuck it's amazing too, because he comes so hard he thinks his brain is going to melt.

He's pretty sure that Hummel's definitely gay, he's all expensive products and designer clothes and stuff and really prissy and obsessed with Broadway, and yeah that all adds up to gay, well as far as Finn knows anyway, because this is Ohio and it's not exactly full of gay guys for Finn to look at and figure out.

Not that he would, look that is, but knowing more about them would be kind of helpful, because, well, because of Will really. Because of the way Will Schuester makes him feel, it's weird because sometimes in the halls when Will walks by in his Cheerio's uniform beside Brittany and Santana who are both hot, it's not the girls asses that make him pause. Or when he's watching their squad practice, sometimes his gaze will sort of slip away from Quinn and onto Will, because he's like really flexible and can do a triple flip, and that's just amazing, even if Puck and the football team start calling him Anklegrabber.

And that's another thing, he just walks the hallways like he owns them, like Puck, and that really terrifying Lauren Zizes who's on the wrestling team. The words fag, queer, freak, loser, they all just slide past him as he walks past, usually humming something obscure or sometimes one of the Bleach intro songs.

Even being cut from the Cheerio's doesn't break him, and Finn knows that's a load of bull because Will was one of their best performers, and Quinn sort of flying tackles him at lunch and cries and breaks down for like five minutes, blurting out that Will quit because Sue's a bitch and tried to force him to quit glee. And that makes Finn think. Actual brain twisting thinking, because the dude must have balls of steel to go against Coach Sylvester. And he just doesn't get why anyone would throw away that kind of popularity, of respect and protection, just for glee…..

Will deals with being shunned by the squad, he deals with being Slushied by Azimio outside the cafeteria by throwing this amazing punch that makes the asshole blow chunks, he even manages to walk to a restroom and clean up, looking completely unfazed.

Finn's sort of going to go up to him and ask if he's okay, but then he sees Brittany looking like hell and hears her breaking up with Will, and sees the two of them clinging to each other, desperately, looking like the worlds going to end as soon as they let go, and that kiss, it almost hurts just to watch it, and Finn just can't watch something so raw, so he walks away, giving the death of their relationship the privacy it deserves.

When Will dances, it's like his bones are made of rubber or something, when they perform Golddigger in the choir room, with that tight, orange Ditch Plains tee on ( Because his favourite Bleach T-shirt, the white one with Ichigo in Bankai still has a faint blue tinge to it, despite Kurt's best efforts. Because yeah, he might have eavesdropped on them talking earlier. ) and jeans that make his ass look amazingly grab worthy.

Well, something in Finn's brain shorts out for a second and he's lucky he can remember how to even sing, let alone dance, and then Will's hand is on his leg, moving it just so, and it's almost electric, it's amazing and all too brief.

The assembly is a nightmare, because singing Push it, and being able to see Will dancing, to a song about sex. Fuck, it does nothing for Finn's really confused "Will-is-hot-but-he's-a-he." thoughts. Compared to all his interior angst, Kurt's unplanned ass slap comes as a welcome jolt back to reality.

And the fact that he hears Will teasing Kurt about it later, makes him feel really weird, because this whole is he, isn't he gay thing, is driving Finn crazy. If he just knew, if he knew for sure, well maybe he could just move on and stop thinking about it!

And Rachel's not helping at all, because her vocal training and the really embarrassing kiss in the auditorium, and her dropping that bomb about girls wanting sex just as much as guys do, in celibacy club. Well , that doesn't help his brain get away from it's insane obsession with sex, and Quinn's not putting out and praying and the making out's just not enough, and he's totally jerking off a lot now.

Things get weird when Quinn, Brittany and Santana join, because Quinn was all anti glee, worried that people would think he was gay for joining so why would she ? Miss Holliday thinks Will's paranoid when he accuses the Cheerio's of being Sue's moles, but none of them can actually look Will in the eye. Which is weird cus if it's not a plan to destroy glee then they could talk to Will, instead of shunning him.

It's painful to watch Will and Brittany in the same room, they sit at opposite ends of the choir room and they take care to avoid each others gaze. Sometimes Finn can see Santana just looking between the two of them with this look, it's kind of sad and a little bit jealous, almost as if she's jealous of Brittany being hurt so much over breaking up with Will. It's like she wishes Brittany had those feelings for her. It's weird, because Santana's got that thing with Puck and she's not gay or anything.

Right?

Will works out, kind of a lot, he runs or beats the shit out of the heavy bag in the gym, while the Cheerio's practice he's working out. It's like he avoids going home, which is insane, because who would willingly spend extra time in school?

Well, maybe someone who has drunks for parents, who joined the cheerleading squad, who practice a lot, who joined glee as well, which was like, more practice. It does make sense if he thinks about it, but it kind of bums him out again. Because that sucks.

The rhythmic thuds of punches on the heavy bag and this resounding hard thump greet Finn as he heads into the gym. Will's kicking the shit out of the bag, punches and those spaghetti noodle kicks, square house, or something kicks, but that's not the thing that freezes Finn in place.

It's the sight of a hot and sweaty Will, shirtless, his t-shirt hanging from the waistband of his shorts, and they're annoyingly baggy and don't show off his ass, but they're riding low and the waistband of his underwear's showing, and the way his muscles move as he works out and the gleam of sweat. It makes Finn's breath hitch and so many thoughts just run through his head that he thinks it'll just burst, because how can one head hold so much ?

He can't move until Will stops, because the sight of Will in action just sends him into this frantic brain overload. But it passes and he finds himself talking to Will like he's not completely obsessing over him, and if he's gay, and what it means if he is.

Then he's, talking, which leads to him offering to help Will. Then he's just working the tension out of Will's body, using the tricks he's picked up from being slammed around on the football field and his mom showing him the basics of massage, and doing things he's done to Puck a hundred times.

And nothing has ever felt this easy, this peaceful before. Because the second his hands touch Will's skin, it's like a switch flips in his head and everything just drains away. It feels right. There's no worry about where to put his hands and worrying if he's going too far, and the fact that Will shudders just from being breathed on, just flat out does it for Finn.

This is so easy, and he finds himself following Will and arranging for Spanish tuition and it all just flows, natural, easy, almost serene. Why can't the rest of his life be like this?


	6. Hope Burns

Twelve days, it's a new record. Will's been slowly counting the days .Waiting and trying to deal with glee and Brittany breaking his heart and dealing with his dad's attempts to connect, which are awkward and strange. How are you just supposed to adjust to your previously distant, drunk yet semi functional father trying to take an interest in your life?

So yeah, he's been working out more than usual to avoid going home, it turns out that when she's not completely wasted his mom can actually cook. She's not as good as Will is, but it's nice not to have to cook. He knows he's hiding from his problems and metaphorically standing in a corner with his fingers in his ears yelling "la la la, I'm not listening. "

But how the hell do you deal with this, most people know how to talk to their parents, they don't panic and freak out and say the wrong thing, or go all passive aggressive. It's not like Miss Pillsbury has a pamphlet for this kind of thing, and there's no damn way that Will's going to unload on her. He has too much pride for that.

So when he comes home from school and his work out session, and smells burnt Marinara sauce and the smoke alarm's screeching. Well, it looks like twelve days is his mothers limit for sobriety. It's time to suppress that sense of hope that he was hanging onto, and hating himself for doing it. Time to get back to their fucked up version of normality.

He does what he always does, he moves his mom out of the kitchen, dumps her attempt at dinner in the sink, and starts over. And when his dad comes in at six, they all sit down and eat. He's just waiting, for his dad to give up too, waiting for him to head for the liquor cabinet. Just waiting. But when it's time for him to leave and make his study date with Finn, he still hasn't done it.

That little glimmer of hope, it burns way more than it should, hotter than a thousand stars, so he buries it as deep down as he can. Because he knows it's just going to hurt him.

Finn's place is nice, it's not big or flashy but it's not a house, it's a Home. Finn answers the door with that lopsided grin of his that has half of the female students at McKinley sighing over the fact that the quarterback's dating the head cheerleader and is off limits.

" Hey, come on in, you want a soda or something ? " Finn's grinning and hyper and bouncy, and it's not the first time that Will's thought he's like some big bouncy puppy in human form. Maybe a Labrador, or a Golden Retriever.

" Sure, rootbeer or coke, but whatever you have is fine." Finn gestures for Will to head to the living room and Will settles himself on the couch, fishing out his Spanish textbooks and a notepad. Finn comes back in with sodas and a bag of chips dangling from his teeth. He hands over Will's soda before dropping gracelessly onto the couch.

" So, where do you want to start ? " Will asks, as Finn grimaces at his text books, giving them the same look that Kurt reserves for flannel lumberjack shirts.

" I dunno, I just don't get any of it, it's like it goes in one ear and out the other. "

" Okay, so you can't hang on to what you learn, I hear that a lot. I mean Miss Holliday's cool and everything and she tries to make things interesting, like asking us to talk about celebrities in rehab. But it's not enough. Artie and Tina are always copying my notes . "

" That's cool, that you help them, I don't even get why you take Spanish, I mean you already know it all, I mean you and Miss Holliday talk in Spanish all the time."

Will shrugs, " I like to practice, and I take Spanish because it's easy. I'll get A's all year, that'll bring my GPA up, and next year I'll switch to AP Spanish and ace that, and when I'm applying to College's it'll look really good on my transcript. It's one step closer to getting the hell out of Lima."

Finn nods, his brows furrowed. It's adorable. " You have a plan for getting out of here. I wish I did, if I don't get a football scholarship then I'm screwed, and I need to pull my grades up. I need help, I need help bad man."

Will grins, " Plans are easy, you know where you are and what you want, it's just a case of figuring out the middle steps. When you know what you want, tell me and I'll help. But for now you better open up that book. "

Finn groans but cracks open his textbook as he's told.

It takes a while, but Will figures out what Finn's problem is, time and a short attention span. He doesn't get enough time in class, Holly can't give him the time he needs, and Finn doesn't want to be seen as a teachers pet. And when he studies by himself he gets distracted by the urge to turn on the TV or go for another bag of chips, or just zone out completely.

" Okay, for every thirty minutes we study, we'll take a five minute break, because you can't cram for an hour and retain the information, it doesn't work like that, I bet you just try cramming for hours before a test and forget half of it, right? " Will asks.

Finn nods sheepishly, " Yeah, kinda. So wait, this break thing works? "

" Yeah. "

" Cool, I'll run and get my laptop, we can listen to music or something for our break. "

He thunders up the stairs, giving Will a great view of his ass on the way up, but no one else needs to know about that. He jots down some more notes for Finn, and hears him coming down the stairs with his laptop in hand. He doesn't look up as Finn opens his playlists, but he does look up when he hears Rie Fu's voice coming from the speakers.

" Voice, you know I never would have pegged you for a jpop fan. "

Finn grins as he drops onto the couch, " I'm not really, but she's on the Bleach albums and they're kinda cool, so I looked her up. "

" Careful, people with think you're a nerd if they find out you like Bleach, " Will quips before smiling.

" I'll just blame you, and those kickass T-shirts. "

Which makes Will arch an eyebrow, " Did you google stalk my t-shirts ? Because you could have just asked me what they were from. "

Finn blushes, actually blushes, and Will has to remind himself firmly that this is a STUDY date and not a date. Thankfully the music stops, distracting Finn and Will manages to fix his attention firmly on his textbooks, because just noticing someone wears t-shirts with anime characters on them does not mean that you're checking them out.

Definitely not.

It's about Ten pm when Will decides that they've covered enough Spanish, especially as he has to move Finn's laptop after the quarterback tries to run Bleach fan subs during their second break, which won't get either of them anywhere.

He clamps down hard on his thoughts whenever Finn takes his latest sheaf of notes from Will and their fingers brush, he doesn't let his eyes linger on Finn's lips as they practice their pronunciation, because Finn may be handsome, and smell good, a mixture of warm male and Drakkar Noir and the tiniest hint of Bio-Freeze, and his lips may be really really inviting, even though they're in dire need of chapstick..

He can't afford to let himself think like this, because Finn is dating Quinn. His friend Quinn. His female friend Quinn, so there is no way in hell that he can be interested in Will. Period. It's just that simple.

So they wrap things up and agree to weekly study sessions, because Will definitely can't think of them as dates, and it's a complete accident when Finn comes within kissing distance of Will when he's showing him out. It's just Finn being a klutz, that's all because he steps back when he realises what he's done with an embarrassed look and a sheepish grin and a hasty muttered goodbye.

It's just Finn.

That's all.

He doesn't expect to find his dad sitting in the kitchen, reading Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, drinking iced tea. If he'd thought of seeing his dad tonight he would have thought of him lounging on the couch with a scotch, maybe watching ESPN. Not sitting at the kitchen table, reading, sober. Or looking up at him, his brown eyes meeting Will's greenish grey ones.

Sober.

" How was your date ? "

" It was a study date dad, with one of the guys from Glee. Not a date. Finn just needed help with Spanish. Besides I'm not ready to date anyone else, not after Brittany dumped me. " Will shrugs and heads to the fridge to grab a soda, wishing this wasn't so awkward, so weird, that he knew how to just talk to his dad when he's sober. Not when he's drunk and needs help making it up the stairs or soluble aspirin left beside his water pitcher for first thing in the morning.

He sighs before he sits at the table across from his dad. His dad just looks at him and Will can see that he's just as lost as he is, that he doesn't know how to deal with Will when he's sober, that he doesn't know how to be an adult, to this man sitting across from him. This man who's his son, who's been cleaning up his mess for years. This man who he made, this man that he doesn't know, who used to be his little boy, who he forced to grow up because he couldn't deal with the world and neither could his wife.

" I think we need to talk. " He breathes, and it's awkward and stilted and he can see the panic that wells up inside Will's eyes, before it's hidden, squashed down, erased as if it wasn't there in the first place.

" I don't know how, not with you like this. I can talk to you when you're drunk, because that's easy, that's normal. You just ask for another drink, or snacks, or ask if school's okay. Shallow stuff, stuff that's quick and easy to answer. It's the only way we work. I don't know you like this, sober. It's weird to see you when your eyes are focussed, when you don't slur your words. This isn't normal. " He gestures between the two of them. " You can't expect me to just go with this, we can't be like everyone else, because we, we just don't know how. I'm used to dealing with you and mom, I'm used to having to help you up the stairs and make your lunch before I go to bed. I'm used to this messed up, insane routine we have. And I can't deal with it when you're like this, I just can't dad. "

Tears well up in his eyes, tears that he dashes away with his hand before they can fall. He cradles his head in his hands for a few moments, gathering his composure before he meets his fathers gaze.

" I can't deal with this because I know it won't last. Because sooner or later you will drink. You'll have a shitty day at work, or mom will bring you a scotch with dinner, and one drink will become two, then three, then four, maybe six, and you'll go out to work and come home and do it all again. Every time mom has one of her episodes and you stop drinking, you even look into AA meetings, and I hate myself. I hate myself for hoping, that maybe this time, maybe, just maybe it'll take. That you'll both just stop, because you're killing yourselves and you're messing me up so much, and you don't even see it. You're just hurting so much that you reach for the bottle until you stop. "

His dad's out of his chair and kneeling by his side, arms cradling him in an awkward hug, his hands rubbing soothing circles at the base of Will's spine, muttering soft phrases of reassurance, that everything will be alright, that it'll be fine. And it's just too much for Will because he pulls back and wriggles away and looks at his father, his hurt and confused dad, and just can't stay there.

He wipes the tears that just wont stop coming and looks at his dad, " It's got to be all or nothing dad, you either crawl into the bottle all the way or you give up, because this hope is killing me. It burns and I hate it, and I hate myself, and it's tearing me apart, worse than any break up, worse than watching our house burn down. I can't keep hating myself for wanting things to be different dad. You need to choose, and you need to stick with whatever choice you make, because I don't know how long I can go on like this. "

He turns around and heads up the stairs, and just hopes that his dad will listen, because he meant it, he can't deal with this shit for much longer.

His dads gone when he wakes up, which isn't unusual, it happens occasionally, his mom's still in the house, because she snores like a chainsaw. He trudges through his day on autopilot, Kurt, Tina and Artie don't push him and no one else really bothers him beyond the usual friendly waves or nods.

He takes notes and answers questions in class, but he's not there, he's not feeling it. He's numb, emotionally, because his venting last night was draining and not in a good way. It's as if all of his angst was stored with his drive and his energy supplies, because he just feels kind of empty. Kurt drags him back to his place and insists on slapping a facemask on him and giving him a manicure, lecturing him about dry T zones and appalling cuticles before channel hopping to some vintage Tom and Jerry cartoons and just sitting with him in blessedly simple, comfortable, silence.

It helps, not having to think, just having someone else worry about him for a change, even if he can't let his parents in. He can let Kurt in though, even Burt when he comes home and sees Will curled up on the couch, because they've seen him at his worst and it's okay. They get how it feels to be this hurt and just need the silence, to just not have to think.

He can only ever be weak with Burt and Kurt, no one else, and that's messed up. His friends shouldn't have to deal with this, it should be his parents that see him crumble and help fix him, but they have no idea how to. Will's always had to be strong when they've been the weak ones. He doesn't think he can be weak around them.

It's late when Burt walks him home, making sure he doesn't collapse, because he's just exhausted, mentally, physically, emotionally, hell probably even spiritually. Not that he has any definite beliefs about anything, but he's pretty sure he's running on empty on all fronts. He sends Burt home when he heads indoors, not wanting him to feel obligated to try and talk things out with his folks.

He trudges upstairs and falls into bed. Literally asleep when his head touches the pillow.

He feels better the next day, Kurt, Tina and Artie are relieved and he actually feels as normal as he ever gets. Classes are a breeze, he manages to make Artie blow chocolate milk out of his nose at lunch with a particularly well timed joke at lunch and even makes Mercedes laugh. She's taken to Kurt's company like a duck to water but she's slow to warm up to Will and Artie. It's still a hell of a lot better than her not so silent diva war with Rachel though.

Rachel.

Who completely and utterly trashes Holly's choreography in glee and pushes for them to hire a professional. Will sees her quick and furtive glances towards Quinn, nothing good can come of this if Quinn's involved. Yes she's his friend but she's also one of Sue's moles and Will knows something is up.

Something is definitely up, because he hears Quinn and Santana as they persuade Mercedes to try and date Kurt, he sees them as they get the Cheerio's to help the glee club raise cash to hire this Dakota Stanley, but he can't do anything about it, because he can't talk to Quinn, not when she's shunning him, and Santana's never apart from Brittany, and he just can't face her, because that hurts so much. Holly's no help because a lot of freshmen, mostly Cheerio's, and isn't that convenient, are always asking her for help with Spanish, so she's always late for glee.

He can't talk to Quinn and call her off, he can't get Santana or Brittany to do anything. He can't warn Kurt because Kurt's still not out, and will get all defensive and pissy, and he's sure that if he brings it up to Mercedes that she'll dismiss him as easily as she did Rachel and Tina. He's trapped, pulled six ways all at once and stuck in the middle.

Then everything happens at once, Mercedes busts Kurt's windshield, they hire Dakota Stanley who trashes them all verbally and Will just can't not do anything anymore.

"….are freakishly tall. I feel like a woodland creature. " Dakota spits maliciously and Will lays his hand on Finn's arm, stopping him from saying whatever he's going to say.

" Better than an Evil Queen. Now let me know if I've got this straight, we are your clients, this means that you are paid to choreograph us. Not insult us because we're differently enabled, or you don't like our body types, or our noses, or the fact that we're tall or effeminate. We hired you to improve us, not to verbally abuse us. We're not Vocal Adrenaline, we're not a wall of sound, we're different, but we're your bosses and if you can't show us a modicum of respect you can hand back our cheque and get the hell out of our choir room. "

Dakota backs away under the force of Will's words and Rachel chimes in. " Everyone told Barbra Streisand to get a nose job. " Mercedes nods, " They told J-Lo her booty was too big. " She flashes a grin at the evil queen as the others chime in.

" So what. Cripples and Spaz's and misfits can make it too. What's your point ? " He sneers, and Rachel smiles as she steps forward. " Our point is, you're fired, and I'm taller than you. " Dakota roll's his eyes and mutters " Barely." Before he stalks out, well he tries to, but he's thwarted by Will.

" Cheque, please. You did nothing but insult us, and we want out money back, unless you want to see how you'll fare in small claims court, bullying a bunch of kids who worked their asses off washing cars to get your fee together. I bet we could even take it to Judge Judy. " Will's gaze bores into the short man, letting him know that he's deadly serious.

Dakota glares back at him, reluctantly fishing their cheque from his pocket and handing it back before shooting them one last contemptuous glare and stalking off with his nose in the air. Will doesn't even have time to turn around before he's mobbed by Mercedes and Rachel, until Tina wriggles her way between them.

" Girls, I'm going to need to breathe soon. " He manages to wheeze out. They pull back laughing and he's engulfed in a less lethal hug by Kurt and Artie, Quinn and the other Cheerio's don't hug him, but actually meet his gaze for the first time since he quit. Santana actually smiles, Brittany mouths a " Sorry. " And Quinn gives him a grudging nod of respect, before they all head off.

Leaving him alone with Finn, who's looking kind of awkward, " Thanks, I know you were sticking up for all of us, but it still means a lot that you stuck up for me. So thanks. " He pulls Will into the briefest hug imaginable, awkward and unwieldy and then he leaves. Not noticing the soft grin on Will's face at the memory of the contact, or the way it fades as he realises that he's doing it again. Crushing on a straight boy. Damn it.

The Dakota incident clears up relatively quickly. The Cheerio's talk more to the rest of glee, even though they pretty much have to shun Will. Will convinces Rachel that a nose job would suck and watches as Kurt and Mercedes reconcile and Kurt finally comes out to her. Not noticing Will behind him, not until Will's arms close around him in a hug. He flinches initially but relaxes once he realises it's Will.

" You heard that? " He whispers. Voice soft, quavering slightly as Mercedes closes in and envelops him in a hug from the front.

" I heard. "

" I'm gay Will. "

" I know. It doesn't change anything. I'm bi, possibly pansexual. You're still Kurt and I'm still Will. " He shrugs and watches Mercedes eyes widen imperceptibly, before one of her hands settles on Will's shoulders.

They pull apart and Kurt gathers his composure. " I'm not dating you, that would be weird and pseudo incestuous. " Will chuckles. " There's no law that says just because we both like guys, we have to date each other. Aside from being like dating my brother, I think Burt would be really mad at me."

Kurt rolls his eyes and takes Mercedes arm on his left and Will's on his right as they walk away. " I think that's an understatement. Thanks for telling me. "

" It's no big deal, I'm not ashamed, anyone who has a problem with it can kiss my ass. "

Mercedes giggles, " Isn't that like foreplay for you guys ? "

" Mercedes. " The two boys hiss in unison, before laughing as they leave.


	7. Plans

Coming out doesn't really change much for Will. The football team still hurl their insults at him, and Kurt, but insults are about all they hurl, Slushies don't come anywhere near Will or Kurt, which is a great relief to both of them. Especially Kurt, because getting Slushie syrup out of silk was a major pain.

Kurt actually manages to make friends with Brittany. Which is awkward for Will, so he makes sure Kurt tells him whenever Britt's coming over. It's not ideal but it works. It gives Will more time to hang out with Artie and search for Bleach fan subs since the DVD's are only up to the season six box-set and the waiting's driving Will completely mad.

Artie's a bit weird for the first couple of days after Will outs himself, so Will kind of drags him to an empty classroom and has a talk with him, well he talks, Artie listens.

" Ok, you've been acting kind of weird and squirrelly ever since I told you guys that I'm bisexual. I'm still me, and I'm not going to jump into your lap and get my mack on with you. Not that you're not cute in a sort of geeky professorial way and totally awesome. It'd just be like getting it on with a brother, and I'm not down with that. So are you going to keep flinching every time I offer to push you down the hallways or are you going to lighten the hell up ? " Will rolls his eyes and grins at Artie who looks kind of sheepish and nods.

" Okay, sorry, I mean, I kind of get Kurt being gay, but you being bi was kind of a surprise. And just so you know, I have mad making out skills. " Artie brags, and Will just rolls his eyes as he wheels his friend back out into the halls.

Finn is a little more awkward around Will though, he cancels their next study session. Which hurts a little, but is probably a good idea, because Will's had more than a few sex dreams about him lately and being jammed on his couch with Finn a couple of feet away from him, close enough to just lean over and kiss him…

Well, it's a thought that's sent Will to a nearby restroom to cool down, or frantically jerk off, depending on the class he's in. So much for getting over a crush on a straight boy.

It's probably Rachel's fault, at least indirectly, that Kurt joins the football team. Her constant bragging about her myspace and you tube schedule, coupled with Kurt's competitive streak, which is about the size of Manhattan, lead to him filming dance routines in his basement. Not that they haven't done anything like this before, but it's usually just him and Kurt dancing to whatever takes their fancy, sometimes with Tina,

It's never been planned to within an inch of it's life, with Kurt recruiting Tina and Brittany, co-ordinating their outfits and helping them find the perfect heels for the routine. But now, well now he's talking about lighting and production values and his slightly OCD tendencies kick in.

Of course since Will's abiding by his no Brittany policy he doesn't actually see them perform, and the filming process is completely screwed up by Burt, which leads to Kurt's declaration of Beyonce routines being conditioning work and Brittany trying valiantly to rescue him by saying he was the football teams new kicker, and Tina being his girlfriend, " But we're not ready to settle down yet. "

Will can't stop laughing for half an hour straight when Kurt tells him about it, when they're settled on swings at a nearby park. Which wasn't his best idea, because Kurt pushes him off his swing and giggles when Will sits up and has the swing drift backwards and try it's best to concuss him.

But yeah, Kurt manages to convince Finn to help him get on the team, and Will watches from the bleachers and damn, Kurt has one hell of a kick. Even if he does insist on warming up to Beyonce, and Will can see Finn just wilting under the onslaught of Kurt's gaze. He really should not have tried to veto the music. Kurt's death gaze, or his "Bitch, Please" mode as Will mentally classifies it, is not to be trifled with.

But Kurt's on the team, and it keeps him happy, because he thinks it'll keep Burt happy. Will's pretty sure that Kurt could roller skate around Lima in a hot pink nun's robe and as long as he was happy then Burt would be okay with it. It's not really his business though so he keeps his mouth shut.

Rachel and her complete chick battiness, is becoming unmanageable, what with her storm outs and her constant resentment to anyone who gets a solo that she believes is hers, which translates to every damn song ever written. So when Holly finally gives Tina a solo there's a palpable sense of relief, that New Directions isn't just going to be Finn-and-Rachel-and-their-swaying-back-up-dancers.

Of course she's a complete whiny bitch and storms out, and Tina's a complete mess which leads to Will helping her practice a lot, trying to reassure her that she's not sharp, that she's getting better, that she can nail this. All the while wondering if he could "accidentally" lock Rachel in a janitors closet over the weekend for being a completely unreasonable bitch.

So when Finn comes in just after Tina leaves, looking like he's just been punched in the guts, arms wrapped around himself like he's trying to hold himself together, Will's instinctively in full on " Make it better." mode. Which ends up with Finn having a total meltdown in his arms and confessing that Quinn's pregnant.

_Shit._

Finn finally calms down and Will decides that after news like this the last thing he should have to deal with is the rest of the school day. So Will drags him to his car, texts Kurt to get a lift from Mercedes, if he asks later then Will can always say something about his mom acting crazy or something.

He heads home and bundles Finn into his room before he heads downstairs and pours out a shot of brandy. His mom's nowhere to be seen, probably making a booze run or something, but at least it gives him some privacy.

Finn's sitting on the edge of Will's bed, he just looks so empty, and Will just hates that look. He'd give anything to be able to just kiss it away, but he can't. Especially not now he's going to be a dad. He places the brandy on his nightstand and sits on his bed, just out of Finn's personal space.

He's trying to think of something to say when Finn beats him to it. " I thought I was going to get out of here, get to O.S.U on a football scholarship or something. Guess I'm screwed now, I'm just going to be another Lima Loser, pumping gas, or filling shelves or something. I'm going to end up caged. My mom's going to be so disappointed…."

He just sounds so broken, it's heart wrenching the way he can invest so much pain into his words. " You should drink the brandy, it's meant to be good for shock."

" Thanks. " Finn reaches out and grabs the glass, tossing it back, wincing at the burn, managing not to splutter. He looks at Will and sighs, dropping his head into his hands. " What do I do ? I can't even keep goldfish, how the hell do I look after a kid ? " He looks up at Will, his eyes glazed with tears and Will just edges closer to him pulling him into a hug.

Finn just sobs it all out, onto Will's shoulders until the sobs get fainter and fainter and his weight forces Will back onto the bed, Finn's slumbering form pinning him down. Looks like the brandy was a biiig mistake. Since Finn's effectively pinned him to the bed anyway, Will reasons there's no harm in a nap. Although if he was ever going to sleep with Finn this sure as hell wasn't how he pictured it going down.

He wakes up because he can't feel his arm, and because Finn has him in a vice like grip, almost as if Will's a giant teddy bear. A giant, warm teddy bear who can't feel his arm. He wriggles slightly and a drowsy Finn mumbles before he opens his eyes and focuses his bleary brown eyes on Will. His eyes flicker with a whole bunch of emotions before he untangles his arms from around Will and pulls back slowly. Looking awkward and probably wondering if Will's going to punch him.

" Dude, I'm like really, really sorry. I didn't squish you or anything? I'm kind of a lightweight, and this is super-awkward and I'm going to stop talking now. " He looks away, flushing until Will pats him reassuringly on the shoulder.

" Relax, you didn't squish me and you look better for a nap. So, now we just have to deal with this thing. "

" I don't even know where to start. "

" Well then it's a good thing that I do. " Will slips off his bed and heads to his laptop, flexing his right arm until he can actually feel it again. " Okay, so given that it's Quinn, she'll be keeping it. That's not even a thought. So we need to figure out healthcare and prenatal supplements and sonograms, and some sort of payment plans. If you're keeping this quiet then we'll need to go with cash instead of insurance. Let me just hit the internet and print some stuff out. "

He looks up to see Finn looking at him with this strange mixture of astonishment, relief and awe. " Dude, how do you know all this ? "

Will shrugs, trying for nonchalance, not quite managing to keep his tone level. " I deal with our health insurance, and a bunch of other stuff, it's not important. " He keeps his eyes fixed firmly on the screen, flicking through Google's recommended websites, absolutely not looking up. Definitely not looking, because he doesn't want to see sympathy or pity on Finn's face.

He can feel when Finn comes up behind him, hands resting on Will's shoulders. The heat that he radiates, it makes Will just want to lean back into it, and never move. " It's kinda awesome. That you know how to do all this stuff, I'm like totally clueless, my mom bans me from cooking." He leans down to get a better look at the screen and it would just be so easy to close the gap and kiss him, with his sleep mussed hair and rumpled clothes and the scents of Drakkar Noir and Cool Water mingling on his skin.

But he doesn't, he clamps down hard on those thoughts and banishes them to that part of his mind where all the things he can't or won't deal with live. There's soon a pile of print outs on his desk and his number in Finn's phone, and he really shouldn't be getting such a kick out of that. Finn just sighs in relief when he's got all this information, when he has a plan and guidelines and rules. He gushes out effusive thanks as Will highlights the important bits, and he's back to his usual excitable puppy state by the time Will escorts him out of the house, past his dad, who gives him this _look_, and drives him home. It's only when he's in the car that he realises he's all rumpled and Finn's in pretty much the same state. He drops Finn off and heads home.

His dad hovers, he's just there. He doesn't say anything during dinner, which is take out, because Will's mom is passed out in her bedroom and Will's nap meant he didn't cook, but it's okay because his dad remembered which take out place he likes best and ordered twice as many prawn Won Tons because he knows Will likes them. It's one of the few things he does know about Will.

Will sits at the kitchen table after dinner, working on homework, his dad sits across from him having moved on from Harry Potter to the Belgariad series by David Eddings. He'll look up occasionally and it looks like he's going to talk, but he doesn't. It's kind of distracting, and tense, so when Will finishes his homework and refreshes their iced tea he gives his dad the opening he's looking for.

" You want to talk ? " It's not easy, but damn it he's trying.

His father looks at him and chews on his bottom lip for a moment. " You left the brandy out, are you drinking? Are you, are you having sex with that guy that was in here? Because I know I'm not the best father, hell I'm probably a lousy father, but I don't want you rushing into anything Will. I, I just want you to be safe, and for you to know that you can talk to me, even if we're not very good at it. " George squirms, because they're still so damned awkward with each other, but he's trying.

Will leans back and stretches, before shaking his head. " I'm not drinking. I gave Finn a shot because he found out his girlfriends pregnant, he's going to be a dad, and he fell apart on me. And I'm not having sex with him, he's a friend. He just fell asleep on top of me and he's kind of heavy so we both had a nap. I'm not dating him, I'm not dating anyone. "

Will shrugs, easy and dismissive, because he refuses to make a big thing about this. " But I've had sex, I know how everything works and I know all about safe sex, so we don't need to have The Talk. "

George sighs and rubs the back of his neck, one of those gestures Will himself uses, usually when he's trying to think, to figure out just what to say. " I should have given you the talk, I should have been there. This isn't easy but I'm making an effort Will, I'm trying so hard, but you don't want to let anyone in. I know that we may never have a proper father and son relationship now, but I want us to try, and that means talking to each other. About the real stuff, not just work and school and all the shallow things. " He looks at Will and throws up his hands in an I-don't-know-how-to-do-this gesture.

Will closes his eyes and breathes, gathering his thoughts. " I don't let anyone in, because I have to be strong, I just don't know how to be weak dad. Okay, you want to talk about the real stuff, then we'll talk about the real stuff. I haven't had sex with Finn, but if he was gay or bi then I would. Because I'm bisexual, I like guys and girls. I've had sex with two guys and one girl. I'm fine with who I am, and I'm not sleeping around. So yeah, that's about the deepest, most real thing I have right now. Everything else is just school and chores and glee. "

His dad leans back in his seat, chewing on his bottom lip again. " You're sure? It's not just a phase, or experimentation ? "

" I'm sure, most of my sex dreams are about guys. Girls are in there too but less than half the time. " George evades the whole sex dreams thing, thankfully because Will doesn't need the mental scarring that the talk would inflict upon him.

" What about children, I mean I did see myself as a grandfather. " His dad sounds so wistful, and truthfully Will's never thought that far ahead, not in detail, but he knows his options, hell after dealing with Rachel he knows way more about surrogacy than he ever wanted to hear.

" There's adoption, or surrogacy, but I think I'd prefer to adopt, give a kid who needs it a home." And not spawn another Rachel Berry to torture the world, he thinks to himself.

" You're okay with it, being bi ? "

" I've been okay with it since I figured it out when I was thirteen. " Because really it's not that big a deal, it's a part of him, but not all of him.

" I just want you to be happy, I don't want the people around here to judge you or pick on you. I want to try and look out for you. "

" I'm okay. There are the usual insults at school, but I've been getting those since I joined the Cheerio's, and no one's dumb enough to try and give me a Slushie facial, not since I punched Azimio so hard he blew chunks. I'm not alone, I have friends and there's always PFLAG meetings, even Lima has a chapter. Although I'd bet money that Rachel Berry and her dads dominate it." Will rolls his eyes and grins, wondering if she pulls her diva storm outs during meetings.

His dad nods. " You're my son and I love you and so long as you're happy then I'll support you. And if you ever want me to come to those meetings I will. I want to be your dad, not just your father, I know it might be a case of too little too late, but I have to try. We both have to try. "

He slips out of his chair and comes around the table and pulls Will into a hug, it's awkward but it's a start.

Notes in his locker aren't unusual, usually it's something along the lines of " God hates fags." or something equally unoriginal, but this one is different, scented notepaper, elegant cursive script and a doodle of a bumblebee wearing a crown. Quinn may pretend she hates the term Queen Bee but that's just a front. She kind of enjoys it, along with HBIC and BAMF, because it shows the fear or respect people have for her, although Will's pretty sure that even thumbscrews couldn't drag that particular confession out of her.

_Thank you._

_I'm sorry._

_Q._

_Brief and to the point, but Quinn still has to shun him to avoid pissing off Sue, so she can't exactly talk to him in the hallways. It's a start though._

_School is quite frankly surreal, because Coach Tanaka and Holly are working together to teach the football team to do The Single Ladies routine to build team spirit or solidarity. It's so out there that Will finds himself doing a double take as he passes the choir room and backtracking._

_It's sort of like a car crash, you keep watching even though you know you shouldn't, they're not great, well most of them aren't great, but Matt Rutherford and Mike Chang seem to be picking it up quickly, and so does Puckerman._

_Hmm, maybe he's not a complete waste of skin after all._

_Of course nothing ever goes as planned, the game comes around and the jocks immediately develop stage fright, well it's more like Oh-gods-people-are-going-to-think-we're-gay-if we-do-this-and-call-us-losers fright, but stage fright sounds so much better._

_Kurt practically begged Will to watch the game with Burt, pretty much bribing him with cookies, which he didn't have to do, but hey never let it be said that Will would turn down Kurt's triple chocolate whammy cookies. Football's not really Will's thing, although men in tight pants do kind of distract him, there a few happy images of locker room rubdowns after practice and frolicking in the showers. It's completely unrealistic, but that's what you get after watching a lot of Jock type porn. Which he really needs to cut down on._

_The game is almost as bad as the one where they lost to the school for the deaf, and Will finds himself wondering if they qualify for the worst high school football team record yet, when they finally get their shit together. Beyonce blares out of the speakers and onto the field and the guys start dancing. They actually manage to pull it off, some of the other teams guys shaking their hips to the beat until they're glared into submission by their seriously freaked out team-mates._

_But it works, it throws the other team off just long enough for the Titans to score, and then Kurt's up and Beyonce blasts out again and it's pretty much inevitable, because everything Kurt does, he does well, and the ball flies through the air, between the posts, and just like that they win._

_The crowd goes wild and Burt's roaring " That's my son. " at the top of his voice and he's so goddamned proud of Kurt that he looks like he's going to burst. It almost makes up for the way his fingers are clamped onto Will's shoulders, yup, that's going to leave a bruise. Not that he cares, because it's a perfect moment and he can see his best friend being hoisted around by the other football players, because here and now he matters._

_Will doesn't expect the phone call he gets from Kurt a couple of hours later, it's all excited breathy babbling, and Kurt isn't making any sense, so he just slips on his sneakers and heads down to Kurt's place where he finds Kurt bouncing around as if he's been mainlining Red Bull all night._

_Kurt drags him into the basement and eventually calms the hell down. " I came out to him, and he knew, and I was so worried, but he knew and it was such a relief, such a weight off my chest, and he didn't freak out or disown me or scream and shout. Gaga, I did it. "_

_Kurt bounds over and glomps him and Will just laughs at the sheer manic absurdity of it all until Burt comes down the stairs to tell them to keep it down and finds his gay son hugging his best friend._

" _Uh Kurt, I'm really not ready for you to be dating, it's too soon for that conversation. " He blurts out awkwardly. Kurt sighs and disentangles himself from Will. " We're not dating dad. It was just a hug."_

" _Yeah he totally glomped me Burt. It was a complete sneak attack. " Will reassures him._

" _Okay, so you're not dating? "_

" _No, we're just friends. Dating Will would be like dating a brother. " Kurt huffs._

" _Yeah, not that he's not amazing and cute, but it'd be completely weird. "_

" _I'm not cute, I am fabulous. "_

" _Modest too. "_

_Burt groans at their bickering, " Okay so you're not gay and you're not dating Kurt ? "_

" _No Burt, I'm not gay, I'm bisexual, I like guys and girls, and I'm not dating Kurt. We're best friends. "_

_Burt looks at Will thoughtfully before nodding. " If your folks don't take it too well, we have room. You're right, you and Kurt are like brothers, which means you're like a son to me. If you need us we're here. "_

_The support and sheer acceptance in Burt's words are just too much for Will and he ends up hugging Burt, who's not entirely comfortable with it, but doesn't freak out, Burt's just not that tactile by nature, but he meant what he said, Will's like a son to him, so he lets him hug him. Lets him cling onto him for the brief few moments that he needs, before pulling back with a grateful smile._

" _Thanks Burt, but my parents know, and they're fine with me being bi, but it means a lot that you have my back. You're like a father figure to me, thank you. " It means more than a lot, it means everything, because Burt's more of a dad than his own. Which is awesome and sad and so many other conflicting emotions that just surge through his head. Not that he shows them, just tamps them down in that dark corner of his mind and smiles._

_Burt smiles and nods and Will heads home._


	8. Dreams and denial

Finn knows he's not smart. Not book smart anyway, but he's cool with that. He's just not that smart, it doesn't mean that he's dumb. Even though people say he is.

Like Quinn. Sure, she's beautiful and popular and she's kind of smart, but there's this streak of vanity and cruelty to her that's really bad. It's the way she goes out of her way to insult Rachel, calling her man-hands or Ru Paul and generally being kind of a bitch to her. She does it to him when they're making out and his little problem flares up, not that it's little, but the look on her face when she gets him that hot and he erupts, it's this look of low grade disgust. It makes him feel like crap

Rachel isn't much better, he knows she made a move on Will, back when New Directions formed. He turned her down because he was dating Brittany, and she's moved on to Finn, that picnic in the auditorium and the really embarrassing kiss were proof that she wants him.

But…

He's pretty sure she only wants him for his voice, like if some new guy joined and had a better voice, then she'd quit chasing him, and appearing from nowhere when he's at his locker. It's kind of flattering, but also kind of creepy in that Swimfan way.

And then there's Will, and the way he makes Finn feel, like it would be the easiest, most natural thing in the world to slip his arms around him and kiss him. It's just not normal to feel this way about another guy right? He can't be gay if he likes girls, and Will is nothing like a girl, with his ripped abs and pecs. There's nothing girly about him at all.

It's kind of weirding Finn out.

Studying with Will is actually fun. Which shouldn't be possible, studying is meant to be the anti-fun. But it is, he takes his time and he makes sure Finn gets it before they move on. He takes notes and underlines and highlights and spells things phonetically if Finn's still not sure how to say them.

He never loses his cool, and his idea of taking breaks is awesome, even if he does manage to snag the laptop so Finn can't get sidetracked by watching Bleach fan subs. Hey, he had to try, right? It's fun and easy and there's this kind of spark when their fingers brush, it's kind of nice.

And when he's showing Will out, there's this second, when he's just close enough to lean in and it would be so easy to kiss him, there's this second where he can almost feel it, but he doesn't, he steps back when Will looks at him. Kind of feeling like an idiot, and probably looking like one too.

He thinks maybe he is kind of dumb in some ways.

His dreams have been weird for a while now. Mostly they involve girls, sometimes Quinn, sometimes Rachel, one time it was Brittany, Santana, Quinn and Rachel wrestling in a vat of Nacho cheese, which was really freaking weird.

Sometimes they involve Will. Will making out with him, Will's hands mapping his body, wrapped around his cock. Will's lips and tongue blazing hot trails down his body, teasing his nipples, marking him, claiming him. Finn buried to the hilt inside of Will, fucking him with the most intense eye contact ever. Or sometimes Will is fucking him, or he's mapping Will's body with his hands or tongue, leaving his own marks all over that ripped body.

Those dreams wake him up like he's been fired from a rocket, covered in sweat, with his sheets glued to him with his own jizz. He can barely move after them, just relearn how to breathe, let his heart rate slow down and drift back to sleep.

The night of his study session, it's not a Quinn, Rachel or hell four girls and nacho cheese dream, this one is all Will, and when he wakes up this time he wonders if he should have just gone for it and kissed Will anyway.

Will looks like shit the next day, and as much as Finn wants to go see how he is, see what's up, ask if he can help him, he can't, because Tina and Artie and Kurt are freakishly good at keeping people away from him. He looks so down, and he hasn't shaved, his hair's got no gel or whatever he uses in it.

He's there, but he's not, and Finn wants to just sweep him into a giant bear hug and keep him, but he can't get close and Rachel's on the edge of things all the time, and Quinn's in one of those moods where if he doesn't pay her any attention she has a bitch fit.

So he can't get close to him, and it's a complete bitch.

Things are okay the next day. And Rachel starts acting up in glee, insisting they need to hire a choreographer, tearing down Holly's dance routines, which Finn doesn't get, because the ones they have are bad enough. Not bad, but difficult enough for Finn to learn on time as it is.

Rachel's never this pissy, not with Miss Holliday anyway. Then he sees her looking across the choir room to Quinn, it's really quick and he doesn't think anyone else saw it, but it did. Quinn's up to something and it involves Rachel.

This looks bad

Yeah bad kind of covers it, because Mercedes has a bitchfit and busts Kurt's windscreen, Holly's always late to rehearsal, Rachel's getting worse with every rehearsal, Brittany's still mooning over Will, and Will's got this seriously frustrated vibe going on.

And then they get Dakota Stanley, who's a mean little midget, who talks trash about everyone and tries to cut half the glee club, and Finn wants nothing so much as to punch the nasty little midget and see if he can bounce off walls. He's just that angry.

Then there's a hand on his arm and Will takes charge and freakin' verbally slays the Evil Queen. It's completely awesome, Dakota practically shrivels under Will's verbal onslaught and stalks away after handing back his fee.

It's amazing because he wasn't just sticking up for Artie, Mercedes, Kurt and Rachel, he was sticking up for Finn as well, which more than merit's a thank you and a hug. The temptation to clamp both arms around Will and kiss him is so strong that he makes the hug as short as he can and gets the hell out.

Kurt comes out, which is no big deal, because everyone knew he was gay. Will comes out too, as bisexual, which is sort of a shock. Lima doesn't have that many gay guys so Finn's pretty much expecting everyone who's not straight to be as fashion and Broadway obsessed as Kurt.

But Will isn't. He's just a normal guy, like anyone on the football team. Of course they mutter about it being freakish and sick and wrong and Finn knows they'll probably be slipping notes into his locker or shit like that. No one on the team is actually willing to take Will on directly though. The memory of Azimio blowing chunks uncontrollably after one punch, and the sight of Will working the heavy bag when they head out for practice has put the fear of Will into them.

Puck's always talking shit about glee, and the constant insults and peer pressure get to Finn, he cancels his next study session with Will. Partly because of Puck's constant innuendo's about him and Will, and partly because he doesn't trust himself not to kiss Will if he's left alone with him.

Then Kurt asks him for a favour, and once they get past Finn's misconception that Kurt was asking him to prom, which Kurt finds really funny. " Don't get me wrong Finn, you're definitely cute, but you're straight and you aren't the best dancer."

Well once they get past that, and Finn finds out Kurt wants to try out for the football team, well the rest is easy. Totally embarrassing when he insists on using Beyonce to warm up, and Finn's idly wondering if you can die of embarassment, when Kurt's foot shoots out and blasts that damn ball in one of the sweetest kicks Finn has ever seen.

Then everything goes to shit.

Everything.

Quinn's evasive for the first couple of periods, and she's walking away from him in the hallways, until he finally catches up with her and asks her what's wrong, and when the words " I'm pregnant. " drop from her lips, the world slows down, time crawls by and he literally feels struck dumb. He gets through the conversation on auto pilot, talk of hot tubs and swim suits and temperatures just flickering on the surface of his mind.

All his hopes and dreams, all those half formed thoughts of Pro football, or becoming a guidance counsellor, all the could have been's, might have's and possibilities come tumbling down around his ears like a collapsing house of cards, all replaced with one tiny word.

Dad.

He's going to be a dad.

He couldn't tell you how he makes it through the next period, or even how he actually finds Will in the auditorium, it's a blur, all he knows is he finds him and he takes Finn in his arms and lets him fall to pieces and blurt out that Quinn's pregnant.

He lets Will lead him out of school and to his car, being guided by his hand on Finn's elbow, he lets him drive him to his place and bundle him up the stairs into Will's room. Will vanishes downstairs for a couple of minutes and Finn just can't even muster the energy to look around, to see what Will's room is actually like, what games he has, or books he reads, the posters on his walls.

He's just numb. He registers Will placing a tumbler on his nightstand and sitting just outside of his space. Giving him space, respecting his boundaries or something. He just blurts out his feeling trapped and Will listens and tells him to drink the brandy, cus it's good for shock. And dear god the thought of alcohol has never felt like such a relief, not like at parties when it's social and expected, but just to stop the pain and fear.

It's strong and burns slightly, he manages not to splutter. Then has another mini freakout before Will has him in his arms again, listening to him sob incoherently, even as the brandy makes him drowsy and he feels himself dozing, before the alcohol nudges him over the edge.

He doesn't dream, he's not sure how long he's out for, but he wakes up half on top of Will, arms clamped around him, he feels safe. Safe and warm. Will's dozing beneath him, and if this is the only time this ever happens then Finn's just going to savour it, and lie there, memorising every second until it ends.

Because it will end. He's going to have a kid. He can't wonder about kissing Will, or what it'd be like to run his hands through those curls during sex, or shower with him, or any of those thoughts or fantasies he's entertained on the edge of sleep.

He's going to be a dad.

He drowses until Will wakes up and wriggles to get out of his grip, then opens his eyes and regretfully pulls away, making his apologies, wishing he didn't have to pull himself away. Will just accepts his apology and goes straight for his laptop, fingers blurring over keys as he mines google for all it's worth, getting slightly tight lipped when Finn asks how he knows all this, but not making a big thing of it.

Not showing how much it sucks that he has to do all these things because his folks are drunks. It has to suck big time but Will just keeps working google, printing page after page of stuff, and highlighting this stuff, underlining that paragraph, detailing check ups and sonograms and cost and payment plans, and comparing pre-natal vitamin prices online.

It's amazing and intense and all Finn can do is babble thanks and feel that things don't suck so much, not now that he has a plan. He's almost normal as Will drives him home. He doesn't realise how he looks until he gets home and heads to the bathroom to brush the lingering brandy taste from his mouth and sees himself in the mirror, hair all mussed, clothes rumpled, this is what he looks like after a heavy making out session with Quinn, well minus the wet spot on his pants and the lingering feeling of shame.

Which sucks, because if he's going to look like he's been fooling around he should at least have had the fooling around. Here comes that dumb feeling again.

Quinn is initially pissed off when he tells her he told Will, but once she sees all the print outs and notes and stuff, she forgives him. It still doesn't stop her shunning him in the hallways and that kind of pisses Finn off, okay she's a Cheerio, but Coach Sylvester doesn't freakin' own her.

Another thing that pisses him off is the resistance of the football team, they're so worried about their image that they'd actually ignore advice from the only guy on the team that can score. In the end it takes Coach Tanaka and Miss Holliday in a really tight skirt and a sheer white blouse to convince the guys to go along with it.

Hell, if she wore that blouse and did jumping jacks she could probably have the team wrapped around her little finger, clearly she knows the persuasive power of the boob. Of course it kind of slows down the learning process, cus having the guys ogle her means they're not exactly paying attention to the steps.

Still, he's not going to complain about the view.

Stupid masculine pride.

They're losing, as usual, and they just won't do the damn dance, Finn just wants to scream, or punch something, because it's so goddamned dumb! They don't listen, not until he manages to convince Puck and he has no freakin' idea why calling him a loser swung the whole thing.

Not that he'll complain, because it works, and they freak the hell out of the opposition. Psych them out enough to score and get Kurt on the field, and it's impossible to lose now, because Kurt hasn't screwed up a kick yet, call it luck, or years of dance training, or whatever, but he's good.

Really good.

When they win, it's amazing. It's like flying. Finn finds himself across the field and pretty much glued to Quinn, because it's just so good and she feels it too, because she doesn't make her usual face when he's all sweaty after a game, she just kisses him back and everything feels right.

Maybe things will be alright after all.


	9. Vulnerable

Rachel is a huge pain in the ass, which by now shouldn't be such a big surprise to Will. But to have her just quit out of spite, especially when Matt, Mike and Puck joined and finally gave them a shot at regionals?

Well he's seriously thinking about locking her in a janitors closet for the weekend. Okay, maybe not that seriously, but it's kind of tempting. Hell it's insanely tempting. So all he wants to do is relax over the weekend, maybe see if Kurt wants to catch a couple of movies or go to the pool.

He has no idea how exactly Kurt managed to talk him into a sleepover in his basement with Tina and Mercedes, but yeah he finds himself at Kurt's place on Friday night sprawled out on the floor on a bunch of pillows, with Mercedes and Tina on either side of him and Kurt curled up on Mercedes other side. Pigging out on popcorn and low sodium chips and watching Funny Girl, with Funny Lady to follow, because it's Kurt and there's no way he's not going to put the sequel on as soon as the credits roll.

Still it's kind of nice, and the look on Burt's face when he saw Will and Kurt curled up with Tina and Mercedes was priceless.

They don't even make it through Funny Girl before Mercedes finally has the urge to gossip, which is inevitable, because that girl loves to gossip. " So did you really have a threeway in freshman year ? " She blurts out, halfway through Barbra singing "Don't rain on my parade. " Which would normally be a hanging offence in Kurt's proximity, but apparently the prospect of gossip this hot is enough to ameliorate his homicidal tendencies.

All eyes are on Will and he figures honesty is the best policy, he's among friends after all. " Yeah, at the Hotel after Nationals in freshman year. Two of the seniors and me, "

Tina emit's a high pitched squeal and turns to face him, " Oh god, that's true? That is so hot. "

Mercedes flicks her a cautious glance, " Really, I mean, I thought sex was more special with one person. "

Tina waves her hand dismissively, " M-m-maybe, but guys making out with each other is amazingly hot. "

" And you would know this how ? " Kurt asks arching one of his eyebrows.

Tina giggles, " The internet, there are so many gay porn tube sites, it's hot. "

Will grins, " Tina, does anyone else know you have a crazy kink for gay porn ? "

Mercedes chuckles at Tina's resultant blush and pauses for a moment, " I dunno, I mean I'm down with the gay boys, but I don't get how guys making out is hot. "

Tina rolls her eyes, " It just is, it's really hot. "

Mercedes shakes her head, " I'm still not feeling it. "

Will's chuckling to himself between the two girls, " Well, why don't you just use Kurt's computer and hit one of Tina's sites. "

Kurt glares at him, " Oh no, not happening, my computer is a porn free zone, and it's going to stay that way. I just can't watch those things, not without wondering what their mother's would think. " He flushes and shudders and looks away.

Tina looks between Will and Kurt and her face lights up. " We don't need the internet, we have two guys right here, they could totally make out. "

Kurt splutters, Mercedes looks intrigued and Will chuckles, " If I make out with Kurt, then you have to make out with Mercedes. "

Tina looks over at Mercedes, who's looking distinctly nervous, " T-t-that works for me, 'Cedes is cute. "

" Excuse me, but don't we get a say in this ? " Kurt bitches, but it's automatic bitching, with none of his usual flair or sting. Mercedes nibbles her bottom lip and toys with a strand of her hair before laying a hand on Kurt's arm, " It's okay boo, it's like practice for the real thing. "

Kurt's eyes flicker across Will's face, resting on his lips. " Just kissing, this doesn't mean we're dating, or anything more than that. " He crawls across Mercedes and sit's in Will's lap. Will's arms slip to his waist, supporting him, bracing him as Kurt leans in slowly. Their lips brush slowly, it's gentle and chaste for the first few seconds until Kurt gains more confidence, his lips become more insistent against Will's, his tongue slipping out, parting Will's lips, probing his mouth. He moans into Will's mouth and Will's hands slide down to the curve of his ass as Kurt's weight forces them down, so he's straddling Will.

He breaks the kiss and looks down at Will's kiss swollen lips, and contented lazy grin and smiles softly before rolling to the side and fanning himself with his hand. Tina smirks across the two boys, " I told you it was hot."

Mercedes giggles, until Tina steps across the boys and settles herself on her lap. They lean into each other nervously, their noses bumping slightly at first, before they get the angle right. It's completely different to Will and Kurt's kiss, because where Will let Kurt control their kiss, both of the girls are fighting for control of theirs. No one knows who deepens the kiss into full on frenching, but neither of them give up. It's less of a kiss than a war of tongues, and both of the girls are breathless and heaving when they part.

Tina snickers and curls herself against Mercedes, " B-b-better than watching. "

Mercedes is giggly and slightly wild eyed, " Yeah, but damn girl we are never dating, we'd kill each other. "

Will nudges Kurt, " Death by making out, think that's possible ? "

Kurt laughs, " Maybe with those two, I thought their lungs were going to implode."

Kurt turns and looks at Will, " Thank you. "

" For what ? "

" Making sure my first kiss wasn't some awkward slobbering nightmare. "

Will pulled his friend into a hug, " Thanks for trusting me with it. Besides, you're not going to have any worries in the kissing department, that was good. "

Tina looks over from Mercedes side, " It looked awesome, I should have recorded it. "

Mercedes giggles and rolls her eyes, " Girl, don't even think it."

" I-it was hot."

" They're your friends girl, watching video of them getting their mack on would be weird. "

Kurt clears his throat meaningfully. " Are we done with this increasingly embarrassing conversation ? Because I really would like to watch Gypsy. "

Will groans, " Only if it's the Bette Midler version. "

Mercedes groans, " Oh hell to the no, you are not gonna bitch over two versions of the same musical. "

Tina sighs and shakes her head, " T-t-this could get messy.

It doesn't get messy, Will persuades Kurt to toss a coin to decide between the two versions and Bette Midler trumps Rosalind Russell. Kurt is a graceful loser, Will's pretty sure he actually prefers the Midler version, if only because she's amazing during Rose's Turn.

They end up all tangled up in a massive puppy pile of arms and legs and pillows and unzipped sleeping bags and end up falling asleep sometime around 3 am, halfway through Rent with Angel and Collins singing " I'll cover you. " It's one of the most teenage thing Will's done in weeks.

The rest of the weekend is mostly spent hanging out with Artie and Tina, being absolutely annihilated by them in practically every x-box game he owns, beat em ups, Halo, co-op Call of Duty. Will's never going to be able to beat Artie, Tina comes close but never quite manages it. It's easy and dumb and social, even if Tina does giggle at him from time to time, but he just rolls his eyes at her and makes kissy noises at her.

Two can play that game, and hey at least he wasn't trying to eat Kurt's face.

School is it's usual boring, repetitive grind. Being shunned by the Cheerio's, having to listen to Puckerman and the rest of the football team and their usual shit. Seriously, if being called a fag or an ankle grabber or butt pirate didn't bother him in Freshman year, why would it bother him now?

Things get really surreally weird when he gets to glee rehearsal and there's this woman in the choir room. April Rhodes. It makes Will wonder whether or not Holly is one of Ryerson's customers because this is some weird awkward fusion of wrong and fucked up. An opinion that only solidifies when he see's the way April looks at him, like he's dinner and she hasn't eaten in a week.

Oh not good, not good at all…..

That woman has a talent for mischief, she gets Kurt drunk and bribes him with vintage muscle magazines, which Will wouldn't mind leafing through a few times. Not in that way, because there's a whole sea of internet porn, ok well maybe to see how hot muscle guys were pre-steroids and protein shakes and stuff, but that's beside the point.

She teaches Mercedes and Tina how to shoplift, she has Puckerman, Matt and Mike in the showers with her for a loong time, and the echoes, well it's pretty clear what's going on _there_. So yeah, Puckerman might have actually one upped Will on the threesome front.

She's determined and talented and she's scoped out all of his usual haunts. The auditorium's unsafe, so's the gym, which is why Will finds himself reduced to running laps, because there's no way even April Rhodes can catch him with his sneakers on and a head start. Will definitely does not want her to get her claws into him.

He doesn't really expect Finn to be on the bleachers beside Will's bag, waiting for him to finish his run. Looking kind of nervous, but still with that air of easy, slightly goofy charm about him.

" Hey. "

" Sup Finn ? "

" I need to, y'know apologise for blowing you off on the whole studying thing. I got a lot of shit from the guys, and you were nothing but cool, and I still did it. I'm sorry. " He looks up at Will, this sort of timid, tremulous look just peeking through for a second. It's a second before Will gets it, vulnerability. Finn's making himself vulnerable by doing this.

" Apology accepted, but I'm not going to go back and forth in some sort of popularity inspired freak out. If you want my help studying then you stick with it, because if you blow me off one more time over something so trivial then that's it. You get me ? " Will looks at Finn intently, at those amazing brown eyes as Finn mulls it over and nods.

" Sure, nothing dumb, if I have to cancel it'll be for important stuff, like Quinn and…" He tails off with a helpless shrug.

" Nothing dumb though, if you get shit about studying with a fag then you can either shrug it off or not study with me."

" Dude, it's not that easy."

" What's so hard about it? Fag's just a word."

" It doesn't bug you, at all ? "

" Only because a faggot is a bunch of sticks for kindling fires. It's what the word meant originally. People will talk shit about you, run their mouth off, because they're jealous, or angry or ignorant. Let them talk, because I'm getting the hell out of here, I'm going to college, I'm going to get qualified as a teacher, maybe work on a doctorate and get as far from Ohio as I can. New York, maybe San Francisco, somewhere on the coast, with a nearby beach and a whole bunch of cute guys and girls. I might have to put up with some assholes here, but the second I can get the fuck out of Lima I will."

Finn's looking at him with this look of disbelief and amazement, as if he just can't believe what Will's said, as if getting out of Lima's impossible.

" You've got it all planned out huh ? " Finn sighs, looking kind of defeated, trapped even. He'd probably feel the same if he was going to be shackled to this town with a kid. " I told you, plans are easy. It's just knowing what you want. " He snags a towel from his gym bag and dries off his damp hair, before peeling off his shirt and pulling on his spare.

" I'm going to have a kid, I can't afford to want anything. " Groans Finn, his head dropping into his hands. His voice is slightly muffled when he speaks. " I'm going to be a dad, I can't think about college or what I want, cus I'm gonna have to juggle High School and a kid for junior and senior years. I'll graduate and get some dumb job in a coffee house and there's not a damn thing I can do about it."

Will's not sure what he'd like to do more, kiss Finn to shut him up or slap him upside the head for being a whiny bitch. " Not if you think like that. Your dad, he died in the gulf war, right? " Finn looks up and nods, tense at the mention of his dad.

" There are army funds that pay your tuition. That's one obstacle gone. The kid, well just because you're a teen dad doesn't mean your life is over. There's an OSU campus here in Lima, you could go there instead of Columbus. It's not hopeless, all you need are the grades, besides you have glee, there are like music scholarships and stuff. If we take Sectionals and Regionals, hell even Nationals, that'd look amazing. Don't give up on your dreams just because life tossed you a curveball. Try and hit a home run. "

That look of disbelief is back on Finn's face again, but he nods. " Thanks Will. Listen I gotta go, you okay to study tomorrow night ? "

" Yeah, sure. Catch you later. "

" Later Dude. "

Home is still weird, yeah sure his mom's still deep in her alcoholic funk, but his dad's still sober. Sober and reaching out. Which is why Will finds himself in his dads car on his way to the nearest bowling alley for some father-son bonding. Who knew his dad was _that serious about having a normal(ish) relationship._

_They haven't gone bowling in years, not since before…_

_Well not for a really long time. But bowling's like riding a bike, once you have the basics down it's easy. His dad keeps the conversation relatively simple, which is a blessing, and orders pizza. Which is less than ideal, Will forces it down. It's not that the pizza's bad, it's actually quite good, but it's pizza and it brings to mind that summer, living on pizza and dark hotel rooms and the smell of cheap booze….._

_It's yet another thing locked away in that dark corner of Will's mind. His dad doesn't even notice that he has to force himself to eat it, but this is all so new and Will just doesn't want to jinx it. So if bowling and having to eat pizza will help him to relate to his dad, well then he'll do it._

_They're in their second game when Will sees them. Finn and Rachel, two lanes away. He's bowling, she's just throwing the ball around. Until he shows her how to bowl properly, how to stand, how to send the ball crashing into the pins. Not that she gets it, but that could be because Finn is all pressed up against her, his arm guiding hers, his eyes sparkling as she looks into them._

_He's either cheating on Quinn, which is really unlikely, because Finn's not an asshole, or he's trying to get around Rachel, yeah, that's more like it, she quit glee for Ryerson's musical, Finn wants her back so he's flirting to try and get her to reconsider. Which makes him kind of an asshole, because anyone with eyes can see how borderline obsessed Rachel is with him._

_Is it Will's fault, because he pointed out the possibility of Music scholarships? Or would Finn have done this anyway? He excuses himself to go pick up a couple of root-beers for him and his dad, mulling it over in the refreshment queue. He really doesn't expect Finn to be behind him in the queue. But it's apparently that kind of a day._

" _Hey Will, I didn't know you bowled. "_

" _Hey Finn, it's my dads way of bonding. At least I'm not as bad as Rachel is. "_

" _Uh, you saw that huh? "_

" _Oh yeah, you two were very close. "_

" _Dude it's nothing like that, I was just showing her what to do. "_

" _Does she know that? Does she know you're trying to get her to rejoin glee? Or does she think this is a date, because everyone knows she's got the hot's for you Finn. "_

" _It's, fuck man, we need her. Without Rachel we won't even win at Sectionals, I thought…"_

" _That if you flirted enough she'd come back. Finn you're messing with her feelings for you, and if she finds out she'll be seriously pissed. "_

" _It's not like that, I just want her to know we value her, we miss her, we need her back. "_

" _Leading her on like this, it's not right. You might be okay with being friends with her, but she wants more than that.."_

" _Dude…."_

" _You're manipulating her, and that's the last thing I would have expected from you Finn. You're better than this. "_

_Will looked behind him to see Finn deep in thought, he bought his drinks and headed back to his dad. Finn still deep in thought as he looked back._

_He loses his last game to his dad by three points, but some of that awkwardness was gone, so it was totally worth losing._

_Oh yeah, Rachel is pissed, Will's pretty sure that's going to leave a bruise. Finn looks stunned and lost and upset and when he see's Will he nods at him, silent confirmation that he fucked up, that he went about this the wrong way._

_Will's not really all that surprised when his study session is cancelled because Finn has to go see Quinn. Or grovel on hands and knees in front of her, whatever, but it's advance notice so Will can't complain._

_It turns out that George is serious about this whole father-son bonding thing, because he's in the damned audience for the Invitational's. No warning, he doesn't even ask in the morning, when Will makes him his breakfast._

_It's probably meant to be impulsive and supportive. It isn't, because now Will's nerves are jangling like he's been mainlining Red Bull and his hands are shaking and he's having a major freakout. Is it too damn much for his dad to actually warn him before he jumps headfirst into his life?_

_Having a moment of weakness around April Rhodes is a big mistake, because she's drunk and tries to get her mack on with him and then moves on to Puckerman, but the drunken slobbering is just enough to jerk him out of his funk. Not to mention he has an overpowering urge to brush his teeth._

_But there's no time, it's time to get onstage. From then on it's easy, the music comes and the dance steps flow and it all meshes, it's easy and effortless and it's complete and total freedom from everything, at least until the music stops and they have to hustle to get changed for the next number._

_Holly and April have some sort of discussion and April leaves, and Rachel comes back, and yeah all the drama of the week is over. They still have to perform though, and it's a rush to get Rachel in costume and teach her the basics of the choreography._

_They get through the routine and it's sweet, there's a standing ovation and his dad actually looks impressed and proud. It's nice, it reminds him of being a kid, of his dad actually being there when he needed him. It's a kind of comfort and support he hasn't known in years._

_It's exhilarating and terrifying at the same time, because it would be so easy to just revel in this feeling and get used to it, but if things don't work out, if it doesn't last, well that will probably fuck him up even more._

_He's stuck, he wants this kind of love and support but he doesn't want to make himself vulnerable. He doesn't know if he can do it without unravelling completely. _

_But that can wait till later, after the congratulations and changing out of costumes, after the giddy adrenaline rush fades and subsides. After his dad hugs him and tells him he's proud of him and they head home for ice cream and bad sci-fi movies from the fifties._

_Later._


	10. Getting off

Kurt would most definitely not approve. None of his friends, with the possible exception of Brittany and Santana would approve. The others wouldn't get it, the simple need for physical intimacy, to touch and caress and just, well to just fuck.

It's completely frustrating, because he lost his virginity to two guys, and wasn't that fucking mindblowing, then he dated Brittany and she certainly wasn't shy about sex. The amount of money he spent on condoms certainly proved that.

So yes, Will is accustomed to having a lot of physical contact, being able to make out whenever Britt had a moment in the halls or after school, and he misses it. And with Sue's ongoing shun-him-or-feel-my-wrath campaign there is no way any girl in school would actually date him. Kurt's the only other out kid at school, and he is not even going to go there, because yeah, kissing Kurt was one thing but asking him for a hook up is a totally different thing.

Plus the whole insane crush on Finn thing just is not going away, and come on can he have one night when he's not having a sex dream about the hot quarterback?

So if he can't date in school and none of his friends are suitable then he'll just have to improvise. Happily the OSU campus is near Ferguson reservoir and everyone knows that college guys experiment, so a little fact-finding mission to investigate the possibilities there may yield some interesting results. Plus he can scope out the layout, because while he's pretty sure he'll manage to get into a couple of nice colleges it never hurts to see what's in your back yard.

It never hurts to have a plan, or a back up plan, or three. Besides it's the weekend and he has no definite plans, so what's the harm?

Scoping out the campus isn't the first thing on his priority list, because with everything that happened with having to move into a new home, redecorating and dealing with his folks, well he hasn't actually replaced most of his stuff. Sure he got the essentials sorted out, X-box, Bleach DVD's, laptop, replacement Ipod and phone, and clothes, but his book collection's still a shadow of what it used to be, and years worth of comic books and graphic novels went up in smoke. Apart from his mint edition issue of Daredevil 1, that baby lives in his safe deposit box, no way was he risking that!

Which is why he finds himself in The Comic Connection, with the staff grinning when they see him scouring the graphic novel section trying to replace his favourite Batman storylines. He's got the Killing Joke, Red Rain, Bloodstorm, Crimson Mist, Lovers and Madmen and he's just reaching for the last Arkham Asylum graphic novel when someone beats him to it.

He looks up into warm hazel eyes and a sheepish smile, the guy's tall, blonde and cute, broad shouldered and blushing adorably. " Sorry, did you want this ? " The guy has manners.

Will flashes his brightest grin, the one that used to make Brittany melt, " It's cool, you got to it first, no worries. "

The guy's smile morphs from sheepish to damn near radiant as he takes in Will and his armful of graphic novels, and his gaze definitely wanders across Will's t-shirt of the day, it's Byakuya releasing Senbonzakura and the cherry blossoms are an amazing hot pink. It's his new favourite bleach tee since his white Ichigo Bankai one still has a faint blue tinge, despite his, and Kurt's best efforts. " You on a Batman binge ? " He inquires.

" I've read them all before, but I need to replace a bunch of them. House fire." He ambles across to the X-men graphic novels and tosses a glance back at cute blonde guy, " Just so you know I'm going for the Dark Phoenix, From the Ashes, Phoenix: Endsong and Phoenix: Warsong, and when it comes to those ones I'm not giving up without a fight. "

Cute blonde guy laughs, " I think I'd lose in a fight, I'm Brett. "

Will nods and scans the shelves, " Will, nice to meet you Brett. " He smirks in triumph as he finds all of his purchases. He bites his bottom lip absent mindedly, debating whether or not to succumb to the temptation of Old Man Logan. He shrugs and grabs it anyway, looking up to see Brett making some pretty significant eye contact.

" Uh, so don't take this the wrong way or punch me out, but would you like to go for coffee or something ?" He's kind of timid and nervy, it's amazingly cute in a dorky way.

Will gathers all his purchases and looks him straight in the eye, " Coffee as in a latte, or coffee as in code word for a hookup ? Either way the answer's yes. "

Brett blushes and ducks his head, " Uh yeah, the second one, I mean, oh god I suck at this. " He grimaces and shakes his head. Will chuckles and closes the distance between them, patting him reassuringly on the arm. " Oh I wouldn't say that, let me just pay for these and we can split. "

Heh, he didn't even have to hit the campus after all.

Brett's apartment is an education in itself, it's got that typical messy look about it that just screams that the occupants are guys, discarded pizza boxes, X-box controllers scattered in random places, things like that. It's kind of awkwardly endearing watching Brett's look of shamefaced horror and his resultant flailing before Will takes his arm and pulls him into a kiss.

It's slow and languorous and Brett just melts into it. One hand slipping into his hair, dragging through the tight curls, the other hand slipping down to cup his ass. Brett shudders as they break the kiss and breathes out in a great ragged surge.

" Wow, okay that was really, really good. Sorry the place is such a mess."

" I've seen worse, now where's your room ? "

" Over here. " Brett slips his hand into Will's back pocket, squeezing his ass as he guides them into his room, slipping a sock over the doorknob and locking it behind them. His hands slip off Will's leather jacket and wander to the hem of his tee, pulling it over Will's head.

" Seriously, do you live in a gym ? I swear high school seniors were never this ripped at my school. " Brett husked as his lips fastened on Will's neck, licking, sucking and nipping the tender flesh. Will moaned under the sensation, gripping Brett's shirt and yanking it from his jeans before pulling back from those talented lips and making short work of his buttons. Brett's eyes were blown with lust when Will made eye contact and swiftly unfastened his belt buckle, before sliding off his jeans and briefs.

The man was built, tall, broad and toned. Well hung and thick as well. Will smirked as he shimmied out of his own jeans and briefs and pushed Brett back onto the bed, he uttered a slight oof as the bedsprings creaked under his weight and flashed his own wicked grin as Will crawled on top of him and began making out and grinding atop him.

Their hands roamed freely as they kissed, skimming across hardened nipples and the toned planes of muscular bodies. Hips rolling as they ground down against each other, savouring the friction as they ground, Brett hissed as Will straddled him and his cock began rubbing against the cleft of Will's ass.

" Oh fuck, that's good." He bit out as Will tweaked a nipple.

" Fucking's better." Murmured Will as Brett's hand wrapped itself round his cock and squeezed.

" You bottom ? " Brett groaned as Will thrust his hips back aggressively.

" Switch hitter, it's all good. " Will moaned as Brett pulled himself into a sitting position and threw his arm out, fumbling on his nightstand, awkwardly fumbling the drawer open and grabbing a bottle of lube and a condom.

He stared into Will's eyes as he coated his fingers with the lube, " You cool with this ? "

Will guided his hand between their bodies to his ass, " More than cool with it. "

" Cool. " Brett nudged his thighs apart, and slowly worked a finger into Will, eyes locked on him, making sure he wasn't going too fast. Will nodded encouragingly to him and he worked a second finger into him, fumbling for Will's prostate, grazing that sensitive bundle of nerves and causing Will to buck and grind down on his fingers. " God that's hot. " Murmured Brett as he slid his slick fingers across it again, savouring the drawn out shuddering groan that it dragged out of Will.

Will grinned as the spike of pleasure behind his eyes flickered, " Hell yeah. " Grunting softly as Brett's third finger slid inside him. Biting down on his bottom lip as Brett's fingers worked him open further. Nodding lazily when Brett flashed him a look of inquiry and rolled the condom on, slicking his cock with lube.

He flipped them over into missionary position, chuckling at the soft whuff of surprise from Will before he lined himself up at Will's entrance and began easing himself in. Will pushed back to aid his progress and nodded as Brett flicked an enquiring eyebrow at him. He moaned happily as the other man bottomed out, pulling him down for a kiss, relishing the stretch, the sensation of fullness as their tongues slid against each other and Brett began to move. Shallow thrusts at first, barely more than a roll of the hips, but the angle was amazing as he slid in and out of Will, brushing lazily against that spot, sending slow, sweet bursts of pleasure throughout him.

" You can go faster, I'm not going to break. " he growled, breaking from the kiss to nip at Brett's neck and jaw line playfully. Brett groaned as Will's teeth lightly grazed his flesh and he flipped Will's right leg over his shoulder, finding a better angle, thrusting deeper and harder, reducing Will to a moaning, groaning, preverbal fiend. His fingers raked down Brett's back leaving faint red trails as the older man's thrusts quickened and his rhythm faltered slightly, before he uttered a harsh strangled moan and surged into Will with one last convulsive thrust. The groan and Brett's climax were the last straw for Will as his eye's snapped open and he came, spurting hot ropes of cum between their bodies.

Brett flopped bonelessly on top of him, breathing evening out slowly, running a hand through Will's sweat slicked curls before shifting just enough to ease himself out of him. Slipping off the condom, tying it and tossing it into a waste basket. " That was hot. " He breathed into Will's ears. Will nodded, voice rough and wrecked, " Hmm, I'm on " Fire bad, tree pretty." right now. Kind of waiting for my brain to re-solidify. "

Brett nuzzled into Will's neck, licking, probing with his tongue, sucking and nibbling, pulling back to admire his handiwork. Will rolled his eyes and chuckled, " How big is that thing ? " Brett wiggled his eyebrows, " Define thing. " He growled.

" The hickey, not the 8 inches you hide in your jeans."

" Bout the size of a dollar. " He chuckled, before mashing his lips against Will's.

They made out lazily until Will shifted uncomfortably, the drying come on his skin starting to feel kind of gross. Brett rolled off him with a smile and a brief kiss to the forehead before he padded to his door, unselfconsciously naked and slipped out of his room, returning a few minutes later with a damp washcloth. Will propped himself up on his elbows and watched as Brett cleaned him off, chuckling as the washcloth tickled him.

" You want to grab some actual coffee ? I don't know about you but I could use a pick me up after that." Brett asked, a soft grin on his face. Will smiled lazily, " Sure, why not. "

Gingerbread latte's were surprisingly good, Will made a mental note to ask for them in future as he sat in a corner booth of a nearby coffee shop with Brett sitting across from him. The older man chatted happily about his classes, Business Admin and Accountancy, happily enthusiastic about the way he could make numbers dance and spin in account books and spreadsheets.

" So any idea what you're going to major in ? " He asked, sipping on his latte. Will nodded absently, " I really want to be a teacher, do something that matters, I can always take up Accountancy or something serious if I suck at it. There's no rush, I still have a couple of years before I have to apply to colleges."

Brett paused and frowned, " You're not going straight to college ? "

Will quirked an eyebrow at him, " Yes, I will but I'm only a sophomore right now, so I have plenty of time." Brett looked at him, the colour draining from his face. " You're, you're a high school sophomore, oh fuck, fuck, fuck what have I done, oh god, I'm gonna get arrested. " His breath hitched and he dropped his head into his hands.

Will slipped out of his seat and into the one directly beside Brett, tilting the blonde's head towards him so that Brett would look at him. " Ok first you're going to breathe, then you're going to tell me why you have this insane idea that you're going to get arrested. "

Brett, nodded and calmed his breathing, lifting his head up, hands settling on the table and Will laced his fingers with Brett's. Brett shifted to look at Will and took a deep breath. " You're underage, but I thought you were a senior, because you're tall and well built and I had sex with someone who's only sixteen, a sophomore in high school, that's why I'm going to get arrested. "

Will patted him on the shoulder reassuringly and reached across the table for his coffee. " Actually the age of consent in Ohio is sixteen, it's just that all the tv shows and stuff are made in L.A. and their age of consent is eighteen, so people just assume that it's eighteen." He sipped his latte and nudged Brett playfully, " So you freaked out over nothing. The only way you could be arrested for having sex with me, would be if we filmed it, or there were animals involved. So, relax, we're cool. "

The tension drained from Brett's body and he sagged in relief, " How can you be this confident at sixteen ? I still freak out over guys and I'm in college. " he murmured. Will slipped an arm round his waist and let the older man snuggle against him. " I'm not going to freak out over the fact that I like guys and girls, it's dumb, and there are enough idiots out there who don't get that it's none of their business. I don't angst over the fact that I like getting fucked, or giving head, I've got a whole bunch of other issues that keep me up at night, but liking guys isn't one of them. "

Brett looked up into Will's eyes, curiosity written across his face. " What can mess you up more than dealing with all the homophobic shits out there? " He whispered. Will bit his lip, before he gently pushed Brett away from him.

" We're going to need more coffee for this, give me a couple of minutes.

By the time Will bought and paid for their coffee's there was a booth in the back of the coffee shop available and he motioned for Brett to move into it. Will slid in beside him and stared at his coffee for a couple of minutes before speaking.

" It started four months before I turned ten, my grandparents were heading to Columbus for a revival showing of An affair to remember. You know, Cary Grant and Deborah Carr ? They all took my Grandpa Jack's car, because they got on really well, we all lived in Lima, they were always in and out of each others houses, I spent as much time at their homes after school as I did at my folks house."

He looked at Brett and shook his head. " They never made it to Columbus. There was an accident on the interstate, it was really bad, about a dozen fatalities in all, four of them were my grandparents. Grandpa Jack's car was completely mangled. The bodies were almost unrecognizable, if it wasn't for dental records and ID it could have been anyone. If it had been Grandpa Jack and Grandma Liz then my mom could have helped my dad through the worst of it, if it had been Papa Chuck and Nana Shannon then my dad could have helped mom through it, but they both lost their parents at once. They managed to arrange funerals, and get through all the business with the will's and emptying their folks houses and put them on the market, but after that, they shut down. "

He picked up his coffee and sipped it, grateful for the warmth. " They started drinking, I was still going to school, teachers were being supportive and stuff, but at home I had to figure out how to do laundry because my folks were too drunk, we lived on takeout pizza for three months straight. Then one night my mom and dad got into a fight, and they were mad, and drunk and throwing stuff, and mom ended up throwing a bottle of brandy at my dad, he dodged it and it hit the tv, and there were sparks that set the curtains on fire, and it spread. It spread so quickly, all we could do was get out of the house and watch it burn. " He shook his head at the memory.

" The last month of school saw us living in a motel, Dad got his shit together long enough for the insurance people to do their jobs, Mom found us a new house and ordered all the furniture, by the last day of school we'd moved in. Lawyers pushed through all the paperwork with the Will's and my folks decided that we'd go down to Mexico and visit mom's friend Maria at her guest house for a month. " Will toyed with his coffee absently before forcing himself onwards.

" We'd been going to Maria's since I was five, I knew her and her husband Miguel, she's this tall busty brunette, and Miguel's this short feisty guy ten years older than her with salt and pepper hair. Their guest house is about an hour out from Mexico city. It's peaceful and quiet, it's a place where you go to relax. My parents vanished about two days after we got there. They were gone for two weeks, Maria was frantic and worried all the time, Miguel wandered around cursing in Spanish. I hung around with the other guests, helped Maria with the chores, worked on my Spanish and Miguel taught me how to fight. It kept me busy, and I didn't have to think, just learn how to block and throw a punch, how to do joint locks and take someone down quickly and easily. Then when my parents finally turned up, it took 3 days for them to sober up. Three days of them being sick and hungover, almost on the verge of alcohol poisoning. They spent the last week of our vacation smothering me with attention to make it up to me. Anything I wanted to do, they'd do, it didn't make up for their abandonment, but they promised things would get better. " He slumped back in his seat and sighed.

" I believed them, I mean they're my parents right? So we came home to Lima and settled in the new house and for a week, maybe two they were better, but they started drinking, slowly but it progressed. That last week before school I had to do my own clothes shopping, my parents were drunk off their asses, we'd been living on fucking pizza since Mexico and I'd been doing all the chores. I took my dad's ATM card, figured out bus routes to the mall and bought everything myself. That's when my friends dad Burt found me, loaded down with bags in the middle of the mall trying to get home. He gave me a ride to his place and got me to open up to him, tell him what was going on. I've never seen anyone look so damn hurt by another persons troubles ever, I had to beg him not to call Child Protective Services. Shitty or not, they're my folks. I didn't want to leave them. "

He drained his coffee and Brett slid his own untouched cup across the tabletop towards him. " Burt had words with my dad, and my dad promised to get his shit together. He lasted about a week, he could go out to work, get through the day, but as soon as he got home he'd have dinner and go straight for the scotch, Mom would be completely trashed and manage to eat but that was it. I learned to cook, I adapted, I told myself it was just until they got better, just until they snap out of it. Time passed and I turned eleven, twelve, thirteen, fourteen, and they still didn't snap out of it. I do every chore, I cook, I clean, I go to school, I even do our fucking taxes. Taxes, like an accountant, and I'm sixteen. Sure they've had their moments when they stop drinking briefly, but they always start up again."

Brett's arm slipped around his shoulder and pulled him close. " Yeah, that's gonna mess you up more than being bi. I'm sorry."

" Don't be, it's not like it's your fault, and telling someone, well it helped." Will shrugged, " Besides I just have two more years then I can bail, get out of Lima, into college. They can deal with their own messes then, see how it feels."

Brett's arms pulled him into a crushing hug, " You blow me away, I don't know anyone anywhere near as strong as you. You're going to get out of here, hell you're going to rule the damn world or something. "

Will snorted and shook his head, " Too much responsibility, I don't want to rule the world, just live in it."

Will checked his watch and groaned, " I've got to go, almost feeding time at the zoo." He slid out of the booth and Brett's arms, grinning at the pouting blonde. Brett's pout faded and he bit his bottom lip in thought, " Will I see you again ? " he asked tentatively.

Will nodded and snatched a napkin from the dispenser, jotting down his number and his email. " Here's my number and my email, text me if you want to hook up or chat or whatever. I had a lot of fun today." He leant into the booth and slipped the napkin into Brett's shirt pocket with a swift peck on the lips. The blonde flushed and grinned as Will slipped out of the booth and exited the coffee shop.

He was completely unsurprised when he logged onto Facebook that night with a pending friend request. And the barrage of questions about the blonde hottie on his friends list from Tina, Mercedes, Kurt and Artie sure as hell weren't a surprise.

Some things never change.


	11. That guy

Things are beyond fucked up. School sucks and his grades suck, his mom's having to work a lot just to keep up to date with all the bills, so he hasn't seen much of her in the last couple of weeks. Glee would usually be a refuge and a safe place, but Puck's joined and Rachel's quit for creepy Mr Ryerson's musical, so they're down by their best female soloist.

Puck's being more of a dick than usual and Finn has no fucking idea what the guy's fucking problem is, because he could really do with some support from his best fucking friend. He should be there for Finn, to help him deal with the fact that he's going to be a fucking dad.

Quinn's being a complete bitch as well, she's mad at him all of the time, and they never make out any more, and Finn's wondering what the problem is, she's already knocked up, the worst has happened already so he doesn't get why they can't have sex Or why he can't even get a damn hand job or something at least.

And he's still got this thing in his head, this thing about Will. Because calling it a thing means he doesn't have to think about what it actually is. Because if it's a thing then it's not a crush. If it's a thing then he isn't gay. If it's a thing he can just ignore it and not think about it and just sink into his depressing, predestined life as a teen dad.

Fucked up…

April Rhodes is freakin' terrifying , she kind of freaks him out. Which makes it even more important to get Rachel back, and it shouldn't be that hard to convince her to come back. Some compliments and a few smiles or something, because yeah she digs him, and maybe if he uses the puppy dog eyes that work on his mom, well it might work.

It's time to actually do something about the whole Will thing, because he's a really good guy and he kind of hates the fact that he let Puck give him shit over studying with a guy. Especially when he's like the only person who's actually helped him learn. When Will explains stuff, Finn listens, he gets it, and letting people fuck up his grades just cus Will likes guys, that's so lame.

He's not in the gym, or the auditorium, which blows because Will's jamming sessions in the auditorium with Artie are cool, and watching him pummel the heavy bag is kinda awesome, at least until he takes his shirt off and then it gets kind of awkward. Not that Finn's watched him working out, well maybe a couple of times but it's not stalking or creepy.

Well ok it might be a little stalkery but it's not creepy or anything.

Really.

It's not.

So if he's not jamming or working out, then he's running. Which isn't anywhere near as awkward for Finn as watching him all bare-chested and ripped. It's still nice though, watching him run, those long dancers legs pounding the track, not that he's looking at his legs or his ass or anything. Because he isn't, nope, definitely not.

Will's kind of great, he muses as he apologises, he doesn't bitch Finn out as massively as Quinn would, he pretty much just tells him to man up about the whole studying with a fag thing. Then completely blows Finn away with all this stuff about music scholarships, and army funds.

Ok, now he needs Rachel back, not just to get rid of April, but for his future.

Rachel is kind of easy to manipulate, but he's not really doing anything wrong, not really. He's helping her with her lines, a few smiles, flash the puppy dog eyes and she's ready to elope with him. It's so easy to get her to go bowling with him.

She's completely clueless and it's easy to get close, to show her how to swing the ball, to just brush up against her accidentally, to watch her eyes light up at the contact. It's not wrong, really, it's just doing what he has to, that's all.

He keeps repeating that thought to himself, but when Will calls him on it in the refreshment queue, all of his doubts flare up big time, and when he says Finn's better than that, it stings. Because yeah, he wants to be better but he wants to get out of here, and Rachel in glee will accomplish that.

It's not manipulating her, really cus he's not that guy, besides she wants to come back anyway, she just won't admit it. It's all for the best.

Really, it is.

Will was right, because Rachel is furious, and that girl can slap almost as hard as Will can punch. It doesn't help that Will sees it, and Finn realises that yeah he is kind of manipulative, that he totally tried to make Rachel do stuff.

It shakes him, because he's a nice guy, at least he thinks he is, but fuck, nice guys don't throw pee balloons, or egg peoples houses and all the guilt and insecurity just floods back. What if he is that guy? He cancels his study date with Will, because how can he even look the guy in the eye, how can he face him when Will thinks he can be better than he is and Finn just keeps fucking up ?

He's tired and nervy and kind of freaked out at Invitational's, because yeah they've rehearsed and they know the routine, but sweet Jesus it's _real, and there's an actual audience and it's nothing like the assembly where they did Push It. Fuck, even Will's twitchy and freaking and Kurt's got him in a corner telling him to calm down and relax. Which is weird because usually Will's the solid one telling Kurt to relax._

_They pull it together, and the second the music starts it's like Will just comes into focus, hitting all the right notes on cue, flowing with the music. Only Mike is smoother with his moves than Will. Rachel's watching from the audience and that's just wrong she should be up there with them._

_April leaves after the number, which is completely cool by Finn because she seriously creeped him out, and Rachel wants to come back, and yeah he gets why they're reluctant to say yes, because she can't just storm out every time she's pissed. So he vouches for her and watches as Mike and Brittany run her through the choreography._

_They nail the second number, and there's a standing ovation and it's sweet, it's amazing. Maybe he's not that guy after all, not if he can be a part of this?_


	12. Vitamin Dumbass

It's no surprise that Will's dragged into one of the girls restrooms by Tina, Mercedes and Kurt and mercilessly pumped for information about the blonde hottie who's materialised on his friends list on Facebook. It's pretty much the same interrogation they delivered over the web but now they squeal and mock him for the frankly enormous hickey on his neck.

Size of a dollar coin my ass, thank you very much Brett. He's so going to get revenge on him next time they hook up.

They finally exhaust the possibilities of his "torrid hook up ", Kurt's words. Mercedes opts for " Booty call." and Tina goes for " Filthy-dirty-hot boy on boy love. " Even though he strenuously maintains that both he and Brett are all man baby.

They eventually get down to the good stuff, the new school nurse, since old Mrs Lancaster had the misfortune of breaking her hip by slipping on a pool of Slushie. Her replacement is Terri Ryan.

" Wasn't she married to the used Hummer guy ? " Mercedes asks Tina as she glares at Kurt for calling her a Technicolor zebra for the third time in ten minutes.

" I h-heard there was a nasty divorce, something about him being sterile, or cheating, one of them anyway. Or was it him getting hooked on c-c-crack again ? " Tina muses as she reapplies her eyeliner.

Kurt snorts imperiously, " Honestly, this town is full of gossip. What do we care if some car salesman's firing blanks or is a crack addict. Now can we turn our attention to the original subject and not get sidetracked? Will, sweetie, it's time to get you out of those t-shirts and into something much more flattering. If you're going to make a habit of seducing college students then I insist you don't shame me with crimes against fashion. "

Why is it that the ground never opens up and swallows you whole when you need it to? Will wonders as he tries to work out if he can get out of the restroom before Kurt actually speaks the words. Alas he's anticipated this and Tina and Mercedes have blocked the way to the door, smirking in exactly the same manner as Kurt.

" Yes it's makeover time! "

Seriously, let the earth swallow him now!

It's not that he doesn't admire or respect Kurt's fashion sense and advice, but Kurt is a devotee of bleeding edge designer couture, and Will's always been more of a function over form type of guy. If it keeps him warm and covers him up, then it's usually good enough. The Bleach t-shirts are just a nod to his geeky side, a quirk really, and he follows Kurt's basic rules, no ties if you're wearing a shirt with jeans, no checked patterns unless Kurt pre-approves them and no sweater vests, because he really doesn't want a week long bitching session about sweater vests going out of style in the seventies.

Apparently being out and proud means the old rules get tossed out in favour of Will becoming Kurt's own life sized Ken doll, well apart from the whole anatomically incorrect thing. Although if Kurt thinks he's going to get Will into the McQueen collection he's sadly mistaken.

There's no use actually fighting Kurt, resistance is futile, he's pretty sure Kurt could out-bitch a Borg Queen if it came down to it. The key to actually surviving a shopping trip with Kurt is to moderate his diva tendencies and compromise. This way he might actually stop him from burning all of his Bleach tee's.

Seriously, being jammed in Kurt's Navigator with Mercedes and Tina was not how he had planned his afternoon. Is it okay to send a distress call to your new friend/fuckbuddy to rescue you from a bunch of your friends who're inflicting a makeover on you ? Why is there no etiquette for this ?

Kurt struts around the mall as if he owns it, like it's his own personal runway. Steering Will into store after store, arguing over colours and patterns until they can find something they can compromise on. Kurt wins on the designer front, insisting on Ben Sherman as the lowest acceptable standard. Will wins on the fabric front, because silk is just too much work. After much arguing Will finally caves in on the Doc Martens front, provided Kurt doesn't pick out a pair from the women's range. They reluctantly settle on the original black7B10's before Kurt catches sight of them in Purple Shimmer.

Not that he couldn't rock purple boots but he's feeling a little frazzled after trying on so many clothes and ending up with a bunch of t-shirts that are smaller than his usual size, ones that actually fit and highlight his chest, rather than billow loosely. Especially that sheer black mesh shirt, which he's pretty sure he will never wear, because it's like a second skin.

Apparently that's a look Kurt's going for, because the last store has leather pants, and as much as he hates to admit it leather looks damn good on him, pair the pants with his black bomber jacket , one of those new white tee's and the pants and it's almost a classic James Dean look, but with leather and maybe a few chains. Completely worth it, even if he will have to sacrifice his underwear for the sake of not having a VPL.

He finds himself wondering idly how Brett would react to the look, or Finn? No, no, no he's not going there. No lusting after straight boys. He's just going to have to hook up with Brett and fuck those images out of his head.

School is definitely interesting the next day, leather pants, his bomber jacket, chains laced through his belt loops and one of his old tees artfully slashed by Kurt so that the black mesh shirt peeks through. He definitely gets some looks from the girls, Santana practically purrs when she sees him, and Brittany looks very appreciative before she remembers he's off limits and notices the huge hickey on his neck, which is a rather vivid purple shot through with yellow now.

It's kind of satisfying. He even catches Holly giving him a quick once over, which amuses him no end. At least until glee and her boys vs. girls idea. He's not great about the whole competitive aspect, or Artie's mention of slapping the girls down, Tina will so not be down with that. Finn practically sleeps through glee before Puckerman finally convinces him to go see the nurse.

Oh well they can always teach him the choreography later.

Or not, because he isn't gone long and Will finds himself wondering if Artie's right and Finn's soul was possessed by caffeinated space aliens. He's full to bursting with energy and enthusiasm, it's like someone turned his volume up to 11. But if he thinks Will's taking those freaky " Vitamins " then he can think again.

" Will?" Artie offers the blister pack to him and he shakes his head. " Nah, not for me. " He tosses the pack to Matt , trying not to let Puckerman's leer get to him.

" What's up Anklegrabber, scared to take your medicine ? "

" I don't need pills to keep up Puckerman, and if you really think those are vitamins then you're dumber than you look. " He stands up and slips off his jacket. " So, shall we get started ? "

The choreography isn't that difficult, Finn manages to get most of it down. Even pseudo vitamin pills can't actually improve the guys dancing but he is picking it up. It's kind of a bitch that most of the guys run down Kurt's ideas about costumes and hairstyles, at least until they compromise on the James Dean type look.

Will takes a great deal of pleasure in not being exhausted when they're done, because he proved his point, he didn't need those weird pills to keep up with everyone else. They think that was hard, they should see what one of Sue's workouts is like.

He isn't expecting Puckerman to get all in his face when he's in the gym, reacquainting himself with the heavy bag. Given that Puckerman's a collossal douche it shouldn't be a surprise.

" What's your fucking problem Anklegrabber ? Too good to take your pills like the rest of us?" He snarls.

" I'm picky about what I put in my body. " Will doesn't even turn around, just pivots easily on one foot in a sweeping roundhouse kick. "

" That's not what I heard, I heard your little fag friend, you made out with Hummel and got fucked by some college punk, you're a fag and a slut. " Puckerman is way too close, his breath tickling Will's neck, the warmth of his body pulsing the distance between them. Will steps to the side, out and away from Puckerman, the smirk on his face, the one that sends the Chess club running for safety.

" I kissed Kurt once, I never made out with him, and yeah I found a hot college freshman cus no one else in this town has the guts to grow a pair and out themselves. But I'm no slut, and that's rich coming from you. At least I don't whore myself out to cougars." Will can't help grinning on that last line.

Puckerman's predictable, he always goes with a right hook as his opening move, they haven't fought since sixth grade when he had to break the asshole's arm, but he's seen Puckerman brawling before. No one's seen Will fight though, maybe the odd punch or two, but they don't know all of his tricks.

It's easy to block Puckerman's initial punch and deflect it with a forearm block. Wait for him to over extend his footing and sweep his legs from under him. Wrestling holds are pointless, especially since weight is on Puckerman's side. It's easier for Will to pull back and wait for him to pull himself to his feet. Puckerman growls and charges at Will, obviously trying to ram into him so he can straddle him and pound on his face. It's easy to just sidestep that and trip him again, but this time he pull's his arm up and back, fully extending it into a joint lock.

" Motherfucker, that was a cheap shot. " Puckerman grouses.

" What I'm just supposed to let you hit me? Like that's going to happen. Now pay attention, I have you in a joint lock, you can't move from this position, not without fucking yourself up. From here I can break your arm in at least two places, or dislocate your shoulder. I wonder what a broken arm would do to your spot on the football team? Or your reputation ? " Will murmurs, feeling Puckerman shudder beneath him at the thought.

" You don't have the guts Schuester." Puckerman moans, aiming for confident bravado and failing completely, a sheen of sweat forming on his brow. Will hums thoughtfully and pulls on his arm, just hard enough to get Puckerman to whimper.

" I have more guts than anyone in this fucking town. I'm out and proud, I take shit from assholes like you every damn day, I go home and deal with two lousy drunks for parents, I keep my damn grades up and deal with the fact that I'm a fucking social pariah." He relaxed his hold on Puckerman's arm to whisper in his ear. " So don't tell me I don't have the guts to break your arm. Hell, with all the shit you've pulled no one would blame me."

He released the other man's arm and stepped back. Puckerman glared at him. " Fag. " He muttered before stumbling to his feet and lunging towards Will with a left jab. Some people don't know when to back the fuck off, Will blocked it again and slammed his palm into Puckerman's solar plexus and followed it with a stiff finger strike to the throat. Puckerman stumbled backwards wheezing and choking.

" I can keep this up all night Puckerman. "

" Why don't you just do it then, you say you can break my arms, or legs, do it, fuck me up. "

" You're already fucked up if you think I should mess you up. "

" You said I deserve it, all the shit I've pulled on you and Kurt, you should fucking hate me. You should be dreaming about slitting my throat or shit like that. " Will sighed turned away, back to the heavy bag.

" I don't hate you, sure you're a complete asshole and you are so fucked up about gay guys but I don't hate you. You barely cross my mind to be honest, unless you do something nice, or different. I'm mostly indifferent to you." He looked up to see Puckerman on the other side of the heavy bag, looking at him intently. " What, you think I should be plotting ways to destroy you? Seriously, I'm not some crazy super villain."

Puckerman lunges at him one more time, and yeah, this shit's getting real old real fast, so maybe he ups the stakes by kicking him in the kneecap, causing his leg to stiffen, his balance to falter just long enough to trip him so he's sprawled facedown on the floor. A foot on Puckerman's ass, one of his feet gripped firmly in Will's hands and his leg pulled into another joint lock.

" Fuck man, how fucking dumb are you ? Do you want me to fucking cripple you ? " Will bites out. Pushing down on Puckerman's ass with his foot, causing the jock to moan.

" Why don't you? I fucking deserve it, we both know that. Stop fucking holding back and fuck me up already. " He grunts.

" Fuck you Puckerman, if you want someone to fuck you up go pick a fight with Karofsky or Azimio, I'm not going to beat you up just cus you've got some fucked up masochistic kink going on. Whatever your problem is you better deal with it."

He drops the jocks leg and lifts his foot, eyeing Puckerman intently, making sure the idiot won't try anything dumb like attack him. Satisfied that the meathead jocks aggressive tendencies have left the building he heads to the shower, trying not to wonder just what the fuck has the jock hating himself so damn much that he wants someone to beat the crap out of him?

It's not exactly a surprise that Finn asks for some help with the choreography the day before they're due to perform, he's a little wobbly at a couple of points and he's still taking those " Vitamins " so he tends towards the jerky and manic as well. Which is why Will finds himself in the choir room at the beginning of lunch, running through it for the third time. It's all going quite well until Finn has one of those moments when he's out of synch and ahead of the choreography and turns too quickly, his foot tangles with Will's and then Will's falling.

Until Finn's arms are just there, holding Will, looking for all the world as if he's dipping him, and Finn's eyes fix on Will's lips, deep, dark, brown eyes that get closer as he leans in and kisses Will. It's relatively chaste, until Finn's fingers fist into Will's t-shirt and his other hand pulls him tight. Will just melts into the kiss, wondering when he fell into the damn twilight zone and if he can just stay here, until he whimpers in the back of his throat because Finn's kind of crushing him and he hears a soft " Oh my GaGa…"

And now he's fallen, because Finn's dropped him as if he's red hot and he's staring down at Will, sprawled on the floor, gasping for breath, before his eyes flash towards Kurt and he runs out of the choir room as if all the demons of hell were chasing him.

Kurt walks across the room to stare down at his friend, " Will, are you okay? "

" Can you just remind me what just happened there ? " Will murmurs as he sits up and tentatively rubs the back of his head, oh yeah, that's going to leave a lump.

" Let's see, I saw you practicing the choreography. " Kurt sounds way too amused about this.

" Uh- huh."

" Then he got ahead of himself and tripped you." Will levers himself up and straddles the piano bench, shaking his head as if to clear the cobwebs.

" Yeah. "

" Then he caught you in his arms, with this sort of hyper intense look on his face, closed the distance between you and kissed you. " Kurt is definitely enjoying this more than he should. Will sighs and pinches himself, nope, not dreaming.

" This is still Lima, because right now I feel like I may have wandered into the twilight zone. " Kurt snorts derisively, " Nope, we're still in this appalling cow town." He wanders over to Will and pinches him, hard.

" Ow. "

" Don't be such a wuss, we are here and that happened, I never thought he was one of us. " Kurt muses.

Will groans and stands up, " Don't start making plans or anything, he was probably just high on those weird pills, this never happened." Kurt flashes him his best " Bitch, Please" look and sighs. " Fine, fine, whatever you say, you could just tell him you're into him." Kurt meets his gaze, smirking in triumph when Will looks away first.

" No, I couldn't, because he's going to be a dad, remember ? And he's with Quinn, my friend Quinn. So there's nothing to tell. It's just a dumb crush, it'll fade soon enough." Will looks away from Kurt, examining the piano keys as if they hold all the secrets of the universe. Kurt slips onto the piano bench beside him and begins picking out idle notes.

" You don't believe that. " He murmurs.

" I have to, you saw how he dropped me when I came out, and that was just a study session. He freaks over the gay thing. "

" He kissed you. "

" Everyone has at least one gay kiss, that was it. "

" Yes, and Noah Puckerman will come into school tomorrow in a tutu. "

" Just let it go Kurt. "

" Fine, but I still think you should talk to him about it. "

" I don't think he'd listen, he has enough to deal with right now, a sexual identity crisis could break him. "

" You're in your Damage Control mode again, it's endearing, when you don't end up bottling everything up until you explode."

" Maybe, but at least you help me pick up the pieces. "

" Of course, I'm your best friend, your brother from another mother as the jocks would have it. It's my job."

" Remind me to give you a bonus. "

" Well I did see a rather fetching scarf when we were shopping. "

" You're a total scarf fetishist."

" Hmm I know, delightful isn't it ? " Kurt laughs and nudges Will, " Come on, we should actually eat during our lunch break. "

Finn is awkward and evasive the next day, until they start the routine, and they completely nail it, full of energy and passion and life. Finn manages to actually stay in time with the others during the choreography and the girls are extremely disgruntled by the time they finish. You can practically see the wheels in Rachel's head turning as she tries to figure out how to beat the boys. It's actually kind of amusing.

Kurt's still smarting over the boys rejecting his wardrobe ideas and he's the first to bail, Matt, Mike and Puckerman head off in their little jock clique, Artie wheels off to some AV club thing, and it's just Will and Finn.

" Uh, Will ? " Finn's voice is shaky and tentative.

" Yeah Finn ? "

" _I'mreallysorryaboutyesterday." It's that high speed blurt again._

" _Okay, first you have to breathe and second you have to slow down. "_

_Finn sighs and then inhales. " I'm sorry, about yesterday, you tripped and I caught you and things went kind of fuzzy and I shouldn't have done that, or dropped you and ran, but I kind of freaked. "_

_Will nods and claps him on the shoulder, " I told you those pills were trouble, relax man. We're cool."_

_Finn sags with relief, " Cool, I just got really carried away with the pills and stuff, I barely remember it and I didn't want to screw things up with us. We're friends right? "_

_Will nods, after all being his friend is better than nothing right ? " Sure, we're friends. We'll need to study sometime soon though, your Spanish grades are suffering."_

_Finn's grin is like the sun rising, warm and bright. " Cool, I hate having to cancel, and the stuff actually sticks when you help me. Thursday ok ? "_

" _Thursday's fine. "_

_Kurt, being his vengeful, scorned Prima Donna self ends up clueing the girls in on the whole " Vitamins" thing. Which doesn't really concern Will, because at least this way the playing field is level. The girls are even more manic and hyped up than the boys when they perform. Will wishes he had video of the way Tina's head twitches impatiently as she waits for the music to start, and Rachel is terrifying on those pills._

_He's not really worried about winning, not really, because they're both good numbers and competition is lame, come on, what was Holly thinking splitting them up when they should be working as a team?_

_Damned Rachel Berry and her damned conscience, and the influence she has on Finn. Yeah sure, it's cool that they have the integrity to actually confess to Holly, but then she gets disciplined and Mrs Ryan gets fired for prescribing what are essentially performance enhancers, and now Sue, fucking Sue is joint director of New Directions._

_Oh this will not end well._


	13. Denial isn't working so well

Finn's losing it, seriously. He can't focus, he's tired like all the time, his eyes feel like lead and it's just so damn hard to focus on football plays, or glee. Not with a cranky, pregnant, cheerleader who yells at him about ice cream and bacon, or Rachel and her sort of flirty-ness even after she totally bitchslapped him. Then there's the whole growing pains thing, because seriously when is that gonna stop? Isn't 6 foot 3 enough when you're like sixteen, he's having freaking nightmares about being eight feet tall by the time he's twenty and being even more of a freak. And seriously who finds a hair on their ear? Their damned ear.

Everything's just such a damned mess, school, glee, football, trying to stay on top and not lose his rep, it's tough. Cutting out homework didn't help, he's just crazy tired all the time and when he can sleep he's still having those dreams.

Those ones.

About Will.

Which is still freaking the fuck out of him, because it's weird, right? He's not gay, like seriously he doesn't have dreams about Puck or Mike and he knows that objectively they're at least as attractive as Will is, objectively, because he's heard the girls gossip, and he knows that if Will wasn't on Sue's shit list, that he'd be up to his neck in offers from interested hot girls. He's not gay, because erupting during grinding with girls means he's straight, and you know his mind is completely full of boobs.

Well, when he's awake anyway. It's only when he's asleep that his brain paints insanely dirty-filthy-hot dreams of him and Will, and okay maybe once or twice he's been really glad that he wears jeans just baggy enough to hide the fact that sometimes he gets a boner around Will, but he's sixteen and that happens all the time. It's not because of Will, not really.

He's not even buying his own excuses in his head anymore…..

He's tired, but he's not so dazed with sleep that he doesn't notice Will coming into school on Monday with the hugest purple hickey on his neck, it's massive and it kind of hurts to look at it, because that means someone's at least been making out with Will. At least.

Not that he cares.

Or that he's jealous.

Not at all, no freaking way.

He kind of wants to say hi, but then Kurt, Tina and Mercedes spot Will and drag him into one of the girls restrooms, probably to gossip over who he's making out with, and there goes that chance because they'll be in there till the warning bell goes off and Finn really needs to get to class.

Leather.

Black.

Tight.

Leather.

And chains.

It's a new level of hot, like seriously hot. He's not sure how he manages not to walk into walls. Because damn it, leather looks fucking awesome on Will, impossibly tight pants that cling, and there is no fucking way he's wearing underwear with those on, and that bomber jacket just frames this slashed white tee, and what the fuck, there's some tight black shirt under there and when he moves and the white tee shifts and clings, those rips just reveal that black clinging mesh, it's fucking caressing his abs, or pecs, depending where you look.

And his hair's gelled back and subdued and that fucking hickey sitting on his neck, it all blurs and combines and it's faintly debauched and fuck, all Finn wants to do right now is pull him into the nearest empty classroom and make out and grind with him, it's just that fucking hot.

At least until he walks into his locker, which hurts, but brings him back to reality. Because Finn's not the only one looking at Will like he's a double stuffed Oreo in need of a licking frenzy. Admittedly he's the only guy, but no one seems to have noticed him blatantly perving on Will.

Thank god. Because his jeans sure as hell aren't baggy enough to hide this fucking raging hard on, and he's gonna have to go jerk off quickly before his first class. Which probably won't even take that long, because fuck, that ass…..

_Mailman, mailman, mailman…_

Fuck, now he has to use the restroom just to clean himself up.

Boys versus girls, seems kind of a dumb thing to do, getting them to compete, because the girls are more talented than most of the guys, and Kurt's costume suggestions aren't helping, and damn it, he's fucking tired, what with all the shit in his head, and no sleep and fuck Will still looks like some hot leather sex dream made flesh. Which is why Finn's taking great care to sit where he can't see him, he really doesn't need to come in his pants again today.

Fuck he's dozed off and Kurt and Puck are in his face, but the prospect of sympathy and a nap in the nurse's office is a great thing and he just can't resist that, besides it definitely eliminates the possibility of another Will induced orgasm.

Terri Ryan is weird. Yeah she's hot, in that sort of MILF way, but she's so freaking intense and damn it, she keeps asking all these questions about what's on his mind, then getting kind of pissy when he asks if it's possible to be into two girls, even if one of them is actually a guy, but she doesn't need to know that, no one does. She's intense and her eyes burn, which is kind of freaky, because shouldn't blue be cold?

She's a bit scary to be honest.

There's this lecture about sleeping his way through life and a long winded spiel about all the stuff she did in high school, and it's all just so much blah, blah, blah, in his ears until she sort of frowns and then those weird burning eyes of hers just kind of flash. Then she's blabbing about pseudoephedrine or something and handing him two blue pills and it's kind of weird.

But fuck it, he's tired and can't muster any energy to argue, plus it's over the counter stuff, like a Vitamin, so really there's nothing wrong with it, right? And hey, they're stocked by the candy bars, so they must be safe if even kids can buy them.

He takes the pills.

It's like everything comes into focus, like things used to be kind of blurry, like when you get your eyes tested, but then the right lens is slipped into those weird glasses things and boom, clarity. He's awake and energetic and god it's just such a relief not to feel so fucking tired all the damn time.

The guy's look kind of weirded out, and Artie's kind of weird, asking about caffeinated space aliens, but Finn's head is full of ideas and he's just buzzing with energy, it feels so damn good not being a sleepy zombie.

Everyone takes the pills apart from Will, which is kind of off, but hey no one's forcing him and Finn's not going to piss the guy off, even if Puck's glaring at him and shit. Man this is so good, they're going to completely obliterate the girls.

The dancing is kind of a problem, because yeah, he can run down a football field okay and tackle and stuff, but he's kind of a klutz and uncoordinated when it comes to actual dancing, as Puck reminds him every damn rehearsal.

So yeah, he asks Will for help, because Will can dance really well. Ok so maybe he knows that Mike could help him just as well as Will, and Mike probably would, but really Will won't mind and he helps him with Spanish, when Finn doesn't cancel their sessions, and he really needs to work on some more of those.

So yeah, he has a reason for being alone with Will in the choir room at lunchtime, it's a good reason, not an excuse or anything. It has nothing to do with the awesome sex dreams, or the slightly jealous feeling he gets when he sees that damn hickey.

Nothing at all.

Really.

The first couple of times aren't bad, maybe it's the vitamins or something but he's picking up the choreography, even if he's a few steps ahead, but he's full of energy and slowing down's kind of hard, and Will's being all patient and stuff, and it's just nice that someone doesn't think he's a screw-up or yell at him about ice cream or judge him. It's nice that he's supportive and there.

Then it happens, he messes up on the third run through and gets out of synch and ahead of himself, he turns around and his foot tangles with Will's and Will fall's backwards. Which is not good, then his arms are wrapped around Will and those eyes of his, that amazing greenish grey shade. They just sort of suck him in and it's impossible not to close the distance, not to brush his lips against Will's, to feel them move with his own.

And fuck, he's doing it, his hand's fisted in Will's shirt, and he's a great fucking kisser and all he wants to do right now is just part those lips with his tongue and lower themselves to the ground and fucking grind, because this is fucking amazing. But there's this whimpering noise, and it's Will, and Finn realises he's got him clamped in this insanely tight hug and there's a whisper soft " Oh my GaGa…"

He panics and drops Will, and fuck that's bad, but what's worse is Kurt standing in the doorway, where he's just seen Finn kissing Will. He freaks and runs out of the choir room, to the nearest restroom where he can lock himself in a cubicle and freak out in peace.

He kissed Will. He caught him and hugged him and kissed him and was so close to pinning him to the ground and doing stuff, so teasingly, tantalisingly close. And Will didn't stop him, but he did whimper, maybe he wasn't into it, maybe he was freaking out, maybe he was trying to push Finn away but he just didn't have enough leverage.

Fuck.

Fuck.

Fuck.

Did he just lip-rape one of the coolest guys he knows?

Fuck.

It's not that he spent the day avoiding Will, not really, they just had no common classes, or glee rehearsal, and he didn't really avoid him today, ok he may have sat at the jocks table instead of with the Gleeks but he needs to concentrate on football right? And he needed to ask Holly for help with that Spanish assignment. He's not avoiding him, he's just trying to process, to deal, is it too much to just want to figure this stuff out?

Performing is easy, he's got the choreography down and he doesn't trip anyone up and they nail it, a frenzy or energy and enthusiasm and passion, the mash up is amazing and the looks of shock on the girls faces is completely worth all the effort, even if Rachel's in full on how-do-I-beat-these-bozo's mode.

Heh completely awesome.

Okay so it's not ideal that Kurt's still kind of pissy about his ideas being run down, but seriously, how can you even put the guys hair in cornrows anyway? Matt's shaven and Puck has a mohawk, so that's never going to happen, and dude, feathers, nuh uh, dudes do not wear feathers.

When Finn comes back out of his little daydream about feathers it's just him and Will in the choir room, and there's never going to be a better time to just apologise and make sure he hasn't fucked things up.

" Uh, Will ? " Fuck, even his damn voice is shaky and tentative. Man the fuck up Hudson.

" Yeah Finn ? " He doesn't sound pissed, he could be ready to answer questions about conjugating verbs, or the population of Mexico city, why does he have to be so damn cool and unruffled when this is like pulling teeth for Finn?

" _I'mreallysorryaboutyesterday." _Shit, talk like a person, complete fucking spazz. Why the fuck are you some tongue tied idiot about this.

" Okay, first you have to breathe and second you have to slow down. " It's the same Will he knows, calm, composed, making sure that he doesn't freak out. It gives him this warm contented feeling, it's like being at home.

His advice is good, it usually is. " I'm sorry, about yesterday, you tripped and I caught you and things went kind of fuzzy and I shouldn't have done that, or dropped you and ran, but I kind of freaked. " It's a complete cop out, but he can't say that, he just can't blurt out all the embarrassing sex dreams, or google stalking his t-shirts, or eavesdropping on him and Kurt, or that flash of pain when he see's that damned hickey.

Because he has a girlfriend, with a kid on the way.

Because he does like girls.

Because he just can't be gay.

Because he's a freakin' coward.

Because Will can do so much better.

Because Will could shoot him down in flames if he ever did tell him and he'd lose this friendship.

Because Will could tell him he liked him too and that thought's fucking terrifying because what the fuck happens after that.

Because he's so fucking scared and the thoughts flash through his damn head like lightning.

But they all vanish when Will nods and his hand claps Finn on the shoulder. It's so warm and fuck it would be so damned easy to reach up and hold it, to draw him close.

" I told you those pills were trouble, relax man. We're cool." It's a relief and a wake up call, because he can't do this, not with a kid on the way, not if it'd screw up his friendship with Will. He just needs it, because Will's good for him, he helps him figure stuff out. He needs that, sure he's got Puck, and Matt and Mike, but none of them seem to connect with him like Will does." Cool, I just got really carried away with the pills and stuff, I barely remember it and I didn't want to screw things up with us. We're friends right? "

Will nods like it's not even an issue, like it's the dumbest question ever. " Sure, we're friends. We'll need to study sometime soon though, your Spanish grades are suffering." This is why Will's so awesome, because even after he's bailed on him twice, he still isn't giving up on Finn. It's great that someone has so much faith in him.

He can't help but grin." Cool, I hate having to cancel, and the stuff actually sticks when you help me. Thursday ok ? "

" Thursday's fine. "

Yeah, so turns out it's not a good idea to piss off Kurt, not when he can go all evil and vengeance-is-mine-sayeth-the-gay and rat you out to the girls. Rachel gets all up in his face about cheating and steroids and what the hell, they're over the counter and he's fine, not some sleepy drowsy zombie or anything. So yeah, she's probably just jealous.

Even if things are a bit blurry and he can't remember as much of the performance as he normally would. Happily he remembers every second of that damn kiss, even though he's trying not to think about it because that'll just drive him completely fucking insane!

Holy shit, is she still talking? Does she have gills or something ?

The girls are energetic, well a bit more than energetic, they're sort of rushed and manic, and fuck, was that how they looked? Tina's head is bobbing to the side like she just cant wait for the music to start, and Rachel, damn her, she's freaking scary, it's like someone hooked her up to the power grid. That girl is a dynamo.

Still terrifying though.

Yeah, so guilt is a bitch, and Rachel persuades him to fess up to Holly about the Vitamins. Guilt is a complete bitch. Of course it gets worse when they end up getting Mrs Ryan fired and Holly has to have a co-captain.

Coach Sylvester, who may actually be the devil incarnate.

Oh hell.

Thank god it's Thursday, at least the day won't totally blow.


	14. Brain Bleach

There are some things that Will can definitely do without seeing, and seeing his parents making out on the couch like horny teenagers, well that is definitely number one on his list, he's not entirely sure why his dad's home early, all he knows is this is something he does not need to see, and fuck, now he's going to need brain bleach.

It doesn't help that Kurt is less than sympathetic and laughs his ass off when Will seeks refuge at his place.

" It's not funny Kurt, I swear I'm going to be mentally scarred for life."

" Parents need love too dearie. " Kurt snickers, idly browsing you tube.

" They can do what they want, just not when I'm around, do they have to do it in the living room? Talk about boundary issues, at least if I'm ever bringing anyone around I'll have the decency to wait till we hit the bedroom. " Will groused, flicking through Kurt's ipod in the hopes of finding a diversion.

" You say that now, but you'll end up on a couch freaking them out one day. "

" Let's see who needs brain bleach when I'm through with them. " Will mumbles before slumping back on Kurt's bed.

" So, since your parents are doing the nasty all over your couch, I guess you're staying for dinner ? " Kurt comments before he giggles over a cute kitten video. " Like you have to ask. " Beams Will.

It's nice, not having to cook, and Burt and Kurt's familiar wrangling over what constitutes real food and what isn't is always amazingly entertaining. Kurt always wins, mostly by frowning Burt into submission and launching into discussions on just how bad transfats are, not to mention pesticides and the importance of organic foodstuff if they want to avoid turning into typical american couch potatoes and becoming two more statistics in the obesity epidemic, thank you very much.

Which is a far cry from the drunken slurrings of his mother and his dad's awkward attempts at a group conversation with Will and his mom, which have yet to yield results.

Of course, he should have known that Burt would go into Papa Bear mode at some point during the night, especially since he didn't bother to hide the gargantuan hickey on his neck, he really should have remembered Burt's paternal streak before he agreed to help him with the dishes. Washing whilst Burt dries.

" You're being careful, right ? " Burt finally manages to mutter, after some rather pointed looks at that damn hickey, honestly he's going to plant the hugest most inconvenient hickey on Brett, or keep him on the edge of an orgasm for as long as he can without letting him get off, something like that anyway. If he can survive this conversation without his head exploding…

But yeah, Burt's doing his whole I'm-uncomfortable-but-I'm-going-to-do-this-anyway-damn-it eye contact thing, and this has the potential to get really awkward, really fast. " I know, I'm not your dad, but you're like a second son to me, and you and Kurt are practically brothers, and I just want to make sure you're not rushing into anything. "

He breaks the eye contact and sighs, " I'm not good with this stuff, I have no idea how I'm ever going to get through the talk with Kurt, just, don't let anyone push you into sex, don't feel like you have to do anything you aren't ready for. I know you kids think sex is no big thing, but it's like sharing a piece of yourself with someone, you know? Don't just throw all those pieces of yourself away Will, because you're worth more than that. "

Burt sets down the last plate and passes the dish towel to Will. Will takes it from him with a nod, drying his hands before setting it down and hugging Burt. Burt's not all that tactile but he relaxes after a second, until Will pulls back and smiles at him.

" Thanks Burt. Yeah, I'm being careful. I'm always safe, and I know when to say no. The occasional huge hickey notwithstanding. "

" Yeah, I remember hickeys. Never saw one quite that big before. "

" Tell me about it, next time I see Brett I'm going to get my own back, big time. "

" Just be careful Will. " Burt's got that slightly uncomfortable look on his face again, the one that makes Will imagine him standing in a corner with his eyes closed and his fingers in his ears singing " La la la I'm not listening! " Burt may be completely on Kurt's side and defend him to the death, but he is so not ready for anything resembling details about gay sex.

Will's pretty sure that if Burt watched Brokeback Mountain his head would implode, or he wouldn't get it. Now there's something to do on an idle Sunday.

It turns out it's a meet the parents type day, because when Will shows up at Finn's for their study session it's certainly not Finn who opens the front door. It's Mrs Hudson, well he assumes it is, she's fond of acid washed denim, has dark curly brown hair and some of the kindest eyes he's seen in anyone other than Burt. Sure she's got the beginnings of crows feet and the worry lines of pretty much everyone who's stuck in Lima but she gives off this nice vibe. It's easy to see where Finn's laidback nature comes from.

" Hi Mrs Hudson, I'm Will Schuester, I'm here to help him with his Spanish. " She eyes him up and down and there's a flicker of recognition at his surname, before she smiles and ushers him indoors. " It's nice to meet you Will, come on in. Finn's just at the market getting some milk, would you like a soda while you wait ? "

" Thank you, Mrs Hudson. A soda would be nice. "

" Please call me Carole. "

" Thank you Carole. "

There are usually two types of response from his friends mom's when they figure out who his parents are. They're either really cautious and treat him like he's made of the thinnest glass imaginable and want to wrap him up in cotton wool, or they're snippy and defensive and expect him to plunder the liquor cabinet or act like a delinquent, it took three years before Tina's mom stopped watching him like a hawk when he was in their house.

Carole Hudson, just treats him as another kid, just like Burt does. It's surprisingly comforting that she doesn't automatically assume he's damaged goods. " Here we are, I brought you a couple of cookies too, Finn practically inhales them all as soon as they're baked, so I figured we should have a few while they're still here." She smiles winningly and it's good.

And the cookies are mindblowing, almost on a level with Nana Shannon's recipe, definitely on par with Kurt's triple chocolate whammy cookies. " These are really good cookies Carole."

" Thank you, Finn likes them, so I try to bake them at least once a week, of course he eats them faster than I can bake them ,it's an endless battle. So you're in the glee club with Finn and Noah ? "

" Yeah, I like glee, it's fun and it's a good way to deal with stuff, just find a song that fits and sing everything out. It helps when you have a bad day. "

Thankfully Finn chooses that moment to walk in through the front door before the conversation can swing around to awkwardly sidestepping the issue of drunk parents or why he has bad days or anything awkward. Which is both a relief and a disappointment, because now he gets to avoid the emotional shit, but, but there's this look that she's got, as if she'd just listen and not judge. He's not sure whether to be grateful to Finn or slightly annoyed.

If there's anything that repressing your emotions has taught Will, it's how to hide what you're really feeling, and shove away all the feelings you can't deal with. So by the time he's ensconced on the bottom end of Finn's bed, and hello that is ludicrously small for a guy of six foot plus, he's calm and all about the studying.

Well he would be if Finn didn't keep flicking glances at him when he's supposed to be reviewing their textbook. After the fifth time he does it Will just can't really ignore it anymore, because once or twice may be dismissed as coincidence but five times is definitely intentional.

" Do I have food on my face or something? It's like the fifth time you've looked at me in like five minutes. I'm starting to get paranoid here. "

Finn's blush is still adorable, sadly this seems to be one of the things mental repression is useless for. " Uh sorry dude, it's just that hickey, it's like huge. "

" Tell me about it, today's all about the awkward, if it's not my parents making out, it's Burt trying to give me the talk, or you being sidetracked by Brett's handiwork. " Will murmured.

" Dude, you caught your parents making out…"

" I know, I totally need brain bleach for that image, they were going at it on the damn couch, come on, can't they keep it in their room or something. "

" Now you sound like a parent. " Finn laughs.

" God help the kid that ends up with me. We should get to studying." Finn looks at him, making full on eye contact and flashing that charming lop sided grin of his, " Ok, but for what it's worth I think you'd be an awesome dad."

The studying goes relatively well, their routine of studying for half an hour and taking a break seems to stop Finn from zoning out. And provided Will makes sure he doesn't try to play Bleach episodes on his laptop as a distraction they manage to cover quite a lot of work.

It's during one of their breaks that Will's cell goes off, " I should get this. No fan subs or I'll make you run through those verbs three more times. " Finn groans and rolls his eyes before nodding.

" Hello? "

" Hey Will. "

" Brett, hey, what's up ?"

" Just wondering if you were busy, wanted to meet up or something."

" I'm helping a friend study, I'll be free around ten or so, I dunno if that's any good for you. "

" I'm cool with that, you want to meet me at Donovan's when you're done ? "

" Sure, I'll see you in a while. "

" Bye Will."

" Bye Brett."

Will ended the call, eyeing his cell thoughtfully. Meeting someone at ten at night, that's clearly a booty call, right ? He snapped out of his reverie to find Finn looking at him.

" Hickey guy ? "

" Yeah, I think it's a booty call, ten p.m. that's too late for a date, right? "

" I dunno, Quinn's usually in charge of what we do. "

" Ow, why do I suddenly see an endless sea of chick flicks." Will grinned as Finn flushed. He chuckled.

" Could be worse, I mean you have no idea how many times Kurt's made me watch his Rent live on Broadway DVD."

Finn grinned, " Now who's whipped ? "

" Oh hush, besides you can't be whipped unless you're dating, come on let's get back to work. "

Time flies when you're having fun, when you have a booty call/date waiting, well it positively flies by. Which was kind of a surprise because it's like that last hour just vanished. Not that he's complaining per se, because the prospect of hanging out or having sex with Brett is at least as appealing as studying with Finn and just absorbing his easy good humour and charm like it's contagious. But in a really good way.

What he gets from Carole is a bag of her cookies, which makes Finn go all pouty and puppy faced and whiny, which makes Will and Carole chuckle. Which just makes Finn pout even more, it's adorable and by the time Will finally does get to his car he's still giggling with residual mirth.

Donovan's is kind of 50's themed, like a diner, it's close enough to the campus that it's a college student haunt, no one from McKinley really goes there, preferring Breadstix, but the appeal of a place that's open till one a.m. is not lost on Will.

Or the bunch of students who're in there working on their coursework and pounding coal black coffee and scarfing down donuts as if they're going out of fashion. It makes Will feel almost impatient to get through the next two years and get the hell out of Lima and find some place just like this in New York or San Francisco or wherever the hell he ends up, just so he can be one of these students.

Brett spots him as he enters and waves at him happily from a booth at the back. He's smiling that radiant smile of his and those hazel eyes of his are warm and expressive as Will heads toward the booth and slides into a seat across from him.

" Hey, how was the studying ? " Brett asks.

" It was okay, Finn's just not great with it and he needs a little help now and then."

Brett chuckles, " You sound like a couple of the TA's. "

" Just planning ahead. " Will smirks.

The conversation pauses for a second as the waitress comes and takes their orders, soda and apple pie for Will and coffee and a donut for Brett. " This place is kind of cool, there aren't really all that many places that stay open relatively late. "

" Yeah, it's a godsend when you're awake at three in the morning trying desperately to finish that one assignment that you forgot and you have to hand in that day. " Brett rolled his eyes and chuckled. Nodding at the waitress as she returned with their order.

" You know, I did think this was a booty call initially. " Will chuckled, watching as Brett choked on a mouthful of donut and blushed. " Oh , I guess I didn't think about that, I just thought we could hang out and stuff, not that I wouldn't be up for a booty call, but my roommate's got his girlfriend at the apartment and they haven't seen each other in a week and I do not need to hear them fucking and hell I'm rambling again, I'm gonna shut up now. " Brett looked down at his donut blushing furiously.

Will reached across the table and patted his hand reassuringly. " You are amazingly cute when you flail like that, relax man. So your roommate's sexiled you huh? That sucks. " Brett's fingers curled around Will's and he smiled tentatively. " I'll deal with it, just have to wait till three o clock or something till they're all fucked out." He looked across at Will, smiling softly and looking kind of tired.

Will squeezed his hand again, " You could always crash at mine. " He winked as Brett looked him over and grinned. " Sleeping over on a second date ? How forward of you sir. "

Will chuckled, " We had sex on the first date, I think we're past conventional date etiquette and logic. "

" This is true, you're sure you wouldn't mind ? I mean it's kind of intimate, letting a guy into your home. "

" You did it last time. "

" Thanks, I didn't relish the thought of bumming around Lima till three a.m."

" Probably not a good idea. Okay, finish up and we'll get out of here."

There's something deliciously illicit about smuggling a man inside your house when your parents are blissfully unaware. It's fun and naughty and Will's giggling by the time he and Brett make it into Will's room.

Brett looks around, Will's room is mostly done in creams, because Kurt in his infinite wisdom decided that Dior grey just was not Will's colour. Will fought to the death for plain navy blue duvet covers, mostly because of the way Kurt's eyes kept drifting to sequinned ones, come on, who really needs sequins on a duvet cover?

He still hasn't managed to find anything that he really wants to hang on his walls, preferring to spend his time and effort on rebuilding his book and graphic novel collection, and as for all the CD's he lost in the fire, well forget about even trying to hunt down all of those, especially the bootleg mix discs of Britpop bands who never really made it here. Will's just glad that he managed to grab his ipod when the fire broke out.

Brett's eyeing the room, eyes flicking across the almost obsessively neat desk with a bunch of completed assignments, the tv and Xbox stuffed in a corner and neglected, the ipod dock balanced on the top shelf of his bookcase. It's not really a typical teenagers room, there's not a lot of mess, or clutter, right now it barely feels lived in. Funny what looking through someone else's eyes can show you about your own room.

" It's a bit Spartan. " Is what Brett eventually comes up with.

" Yeah. But good clutter takes years to accumulate, I used to have so many movies and albums that you didn't dare knock them over or you'd end up with a landslide. " Will shrugs, " No point crying over melted discs though. "

Brett comes up behind him and pulls him into a hug, " That sucks. " His hands end up loosely clasped on Will's abs as he nuzzles at his neck. " 'S really nice. " Murmurs Will as Brett begins to sway in a slow rhythmic beat.

" Yeah, it's nice to just cuddle. " Brett murmurs, sounding decidedly sleepy.

"You sound wiped, straight to bed ? " Will breathes, Brett nodding against his neck. " Sorry, I mean I would totally be up for all kinds of stuff, but. " He yawns and Will can just picture the look of mortification on his face. " Okay, bed it is then. " Will chuckles as he drags the sleepy blonde across the room and watches him flop gracelessly onto the bed before he blearily begins stripping to his boxers.

Will slips out of his own clothes and tosses them into the laundry hamper before slipping under the duvet and feeling Brett flush against him. The blonde's arm draping over Will's side, his idle fingers brushing up and down Will's back, slower and slower as his breathing slows and evens out, eventually lulling Will to sleep as well.

He doesn't dream about Finn that night, not in that way anyway. They're back at Invitational's, and April hasn't left, she's on stage singing Material Girl, with leashes around Matt, Mike, Puck, Finn and one around Will's neck too. It's tight and choking and he can't breathe, he's gasping for breath and no one cares, no one notices, April yanks on the lead and he's pulled backwards and things blur and shift until they're not performing in the auditorium anymore, they're out on the football field and the damn leash is still choking him. No one notices, still too busy wrapped up in the song, and Brittany and Mike walk out to the front of the others and start dancing, Brittany's eyes fixed on Will's, she can see him choking, can see him dying right in front of her but her gaze darts to the side, and instead of Holly watching them from the sidelines, it's Sue, and now she's holding the leashes, and they're on everyone now.

He looks up at Brittany who's still dancing, her leash is slack, she's not choking, not like Will, not like everyone who isn't a Cheerio. Santana and Quinn are fine even as the others begin to choke and gasp. Will tries crawling to Quinn and Santana, a mute appeal for help in his eyes, Quinn looks away, scared and biting her lip and Santana just shrugs and averts her gaze.

The last thing he see's before darkness falls is Finn's body sagging, face flushed before he crumples to the ground, landing on Kurt and Mercedes.

Which is when he wakes up, his eyes snap open as he inhales great, deep shuddery draughts of air, just to prove that he can, that he isn't leashed and choking, he doesn't move, he can't move, because his limbs feel like overcooked ramen noodles, he just breathes and burrows closer to Brett, grateful for the warmth and solidity of another person beside him. It feels like an eternity before listening to Brett's breathing helps him calm down and drift off to sleep again.

Thankfully he doesn't dream this time.

Will's glad he's a naturally early riser, it gives him that much more time to get his shit together, do a few chores before school, finish up any homework he's let slide. He's always pottering about doing something, and he would be this morning if he wasn't getting one of the best blowjobs he's ever had in his whole damn life, which is saying something because Britt had a bit of an oral fetish, and Justin could probably have sucked a ping pong ball through a garden hose, but fuck, the things that Brett can do with his tongue….

It's fucking mindblowing and when he does come it's one of those full on, back bowing, toe curling, balls feel like they've been turned inside out orgasms and his brain feels like its melted clear out of his ears. Especially as Brett's worked his way up to Will's lips and he's fucking kissing him like he's trying to suck out his soul, and grinding away against Will until he comes with a deep rumbling growl that Will swears he can feel burrowing it's way into him.

When Will's convinced that his brain hasn't actually leaked out of his ears, he manages to crawl over to Brett and starts work on his revenge hickey. Brett giggles beneath him, " I'm not complaining, but why ? "

Will lifts his head up and flicks him a dark glance, " Because I've had people commenting on this damn hickey all week, now it's your turn, Mr size of a dollar coin. Size of a damn dollar bill would be more accurate. "

Brett wriggles a little under Will's lips and tongue, but doesn't comment, sending him playful glances every time Will pauses to inspect his work. Hands idly tracing patterns into Will's skin as he lies back humming pleasantly. Grinning up at Will as he pulls back one final time to survey his work.

" Good enough ? " He asks, grabbing Will so that he ends up with his head pillowed on Brett's chest.

" Oh yeah, it's gonna be huge. " Will mutters, listening to the blonde's heart beating.

" Turnabout's fair play. "

" Shouldn't that be payback's a bitch ? "

" Depends if you think of it as payback or an equitable exchange. "

" I think we should shower, I have school and you probably have classes. " Will sighs.

" We could ditch and go to Colombus, hunt for stuff to clutter up your room. " Brett murmurs.

Will shakes his head sadly, " I can't, I have a math test today and I should really keep my eyes out for Coach Sylvester's plan of the week to bring down the glee club. "

" That woman's crazy, do you watch her segment on the news ? "

" Nope, I get more than enough of her crazy at school without actually seeking it out." Will groaned as he sat up and nudged Brett. " Right, enough stalling, shower time. "

Brett pouted, before looking up at Will and nodding. " Slave-driver. "

Will ended up showering separately from Brett, who was definitely more than a little handsy first thing in the morning. Not that he had anything against shower sex, it's just not a great idea when you have things to do, not to mention still feeling slightly euphoric, buzzed and slightly dizzy from your first orgasm of the day. He did get a giddy little thrill watching Brett slip into a pair of his boxers after his shower. Talk about a previously unknown kink.

He felt even better when he watched Brett devour the breakfast he whipped up for them, and when Brett bent him backwards over the hood of his car in a ferocious kiss before he drove off, well there wasn't quite a word that summed up his feelings then.

Well, until he turned around to see a grinning Kurt on his front porch, grinning in that way he has when he's just seen a particularly tasty morsel of gossip and he's going to milk it for all it's worth.

Maybe he should have taken Brett up on the Colombus offer after all…


	15. The green eyed monster

He's not really a jealous guy by nature.

Yeah sure, it would be kind of nice to have the cash that Kurt has to splash on clothes and his Navigator, or Quinn's house which is just that much nicer than his, but on the whole Finn isn't too bothered by things he doesn't have.

Turns out this whole jealousy thing that he doesn't feel for things, well he kind of feels it for people. Specifically for Will.

So yeah, he can think it in his head at least, because at least his head is safe. He's still not gay, well he's pretty sure he's not gay, it's not like he wants to get into Puck's pants or Mike's or even Kurt, even though Kurt's all kinds of girly.

It's just Will who's giving him boners and sex dreams and makes him want to jut pin him to a flat surface and just do all kinds of stuff he's never even thought about with his pretty blonde cheerleader girlfriend who's carrying his child.

Which is another addition to this big ball of guilt and god knows what else that's just sitting in the pit of his gut because he's never felt this way about Quinn. Sure he's wanted to make out and touch her boobs and the vague tantalising possibility of blowjobs or even actual sex was there, in a sort of hazy abstract way.

But when he's thinking about Will, in his tiny cowboy wallpapered room cum closet, it's visceral and burning, hot in a way that he's never even felt watching the dirtiest porno that Puck's sent him links to. It's not hazy or abstract and there's no hesitation in his head. He knows that if he ever had the guts to risk fucking things up with Will by ever telling him, and by some freak chance he didn't end up feeling Will's right hook again, that he could get down to some seriously hot action.

He's jealous, it's one thing to stare at that fucking hickey in the halls where Will's attention isn't focussed on him, but he should have known better than to think Will wouldn't notice his gaze flickering to that damn hickey.

But it's not just a hickey, it's like a symbol or something, a reminder that Will's totally cool with being bi, that he doesn't give a fuck. That Coach Sylvester hasn't stopped him from dating, that he can get a guy easily.

That he's not an insecure, fucked up coward. Even if he doesn't think he'd make a good dad, which is total bullshit, because Will just cares so much, even about a superficial friend like Finn that he'd be completely fucking amazing as a dad. Even if he can't see it himself.

Will's got some kind of mojo, Finn's pretty sure of this, cus he's actually learning this stuff, which doesn't work, even when he tries Will's studying methods by himself. He tried the whole thirty minutes plus break formula, and just didn't get it.

So yeah, there's something about him. And Finn doesn't even mind when he answers his cell, cus they're on a break and Will pacing as he talks means Finn can check out his ass, without him noticing. Of course then Will asks if it's a booty call, as if Finn would even know, and he kind of hates this Brett guy because Will's all happy and lit up from the inside.

He hates this Brett guy because he can do that when Finn can't. Brett can kiss him, Brett can plant enormous hickeys and fuck Will, or blow him and Finn can't.

He hates this Brett guy a little, without ever having met him, because he's everything that Finn isn't. It's a minor miracle that he manages to swallow back this fusion of hate and envy and not completely hulk out and turn green or something.

He manages not to let it show, just to keep studying and then pout over cookies when Will leaves. And if he spends half the night wondering what this Brett guy's doing to Will and jerking off thinking about what he'd like to do to Will himself, well that's no one else's business. Not in his room, not in his house, his home.

Finn's locker is in earshot of Kurt's, which has proven handy for hearing what Will and he talk about when Kurt's changing his books or fixing his hair. It's not really eavesdropping, he's getting his own books and he just happens to overhear them.

That's his story and he's sticking to it.

" A sleepover on the second date, honestly you're bordering on slutty. " Kurt sniffs as he tweaks his scarf and examines his guy-liner, apparently it's metro or something, whatever that means.

" His roommate sexiled him, I should just let him drive around town till 3 am when I could have him in my bed like a giant teddy bear ? " Will peers over Kurt's shoulder and flicks an errant curl out of his face. Kurt flicks an eyebrow at him and snorts. " You could buy a giant teddy bear, besides last time I checked a teddy bear didn't bend you backwards over a car hood and kiss you like he was trying to suck the air out of your lungs."

Will shrugs and flicks a speck of lint from Kurt's shoulders, " Or give you killer blow jobs, seriously I thought my brain had melted. " Kurt glares at him in the mirror and shudders, " Way too much information, honestly I swear you've turned over-sharing into an art form."

Will grins and claps him on the shoulder, " Heh just wait till Burt tries to give you the talk, I thought his head was going to implode. "

Kurt shudders before closing his locker and wandering off, " La, la, la, I'm not listening. " He sings as he walks away from Will. Nodding to Finn as he passes.

Finn whose brain is stuck in an obscene porno loop involving Will, blow jobs and brain melting orgasms. He really hates this Brett guy…..

The weekend is agonising, thoughts of what this Brett guy could be doing to Will, with Will, on top of him, or under him, in the back seat of their cars or on the bed that Finn slept on with Will. Quinn's demanding and being a bitch about ice cream and bacon, Puck's nowhere to be fucking found, the other guys on the football team are dicks and he has nothing to do except beat the shit out of his drum kit, going through every damn pattern he knows until his wrists ache and his head pounds but at least it stops him obsessing over what this Brett guy could be doing to Will.

Monday comes and Will's there, blessedly hickey free, but with that lit up look about him that shows he's been with the guy, it's enough to make Finn want to scream and punch something and it doesn't fucking help that that creepy gossip Jacob Ben Israel is lurking in the hallways with his shifty little eyes drinking in everything, it's creeping Finn out big time.

But at least he won't be freaking out about new symbolic hickeys, which is something, right?

There's definitely something going on between Will and Quinn, she's slipping notes into his locker and there's all kinds of eye contact going on between them in glee, he's not worried, because he trusts Quinn, even if she's kind of scary, and Will's got that guy. So it's not a sex thing or anything.

And when Will drives them to the sonogram appointment, well that explains it, and he listens to all of Finn's whiny self absorbed bullshit, he's just so fucking glad there's someone there for him, someone who will listen.

Even if he just wants to just crawl on top of Will and just forget everything

Jacob Ben Israel is kind of weird, he's a gossip-mongering, muck-raker of the highest order and he's got this really creepy crush on Rachel, so it's not really a surprise to see him trailing after her, it is kind of a surprise to see Will nod to her and steer Jacob into a restroom.

It's a really big surprise to see Will practically sashaying out of the restroom five minutes later, smirking with what looks an awful lot like one of Jacob's Dictaphone cassettes in his hand before it vanishes into one of his hip pockets.

What the hell was that all about?

Coach Sylvester is seriously insane, splitting up the glee club on minority lines, that's just dumb. It's worse than the boys vs. girls thing, because they're meant to be a team damn it. Plus Kurt , Mercedes and Artie are really freakin' good and if it comes down to talent, well Finn's not sure that his group can beat them, because Rachel's all about the solo's and is a terrible team player.

This is really bad, and Quinn and Will are still doing the eye contact thing, it's like they're talking with their eyes or something, and he has no clue what the hell's going on there but he does catch Quinn looking sort of sad and regretful at the end of their practice.

Ew, Jacob is kinda sick, getting Rachel to hand over her panties to keep quiet about Quinn being pregnant, well that's just wrong, and if he got Rachel to do that, well what the hell did Will have to do to get his hands on that tape?

Okay even Will being uber-hot is not enough to compensate for any kind of naked thought involving Jacob Ben Israel. Ick.

Well, there goes his appetite for lunch, on the plus side he may have found a replacement for his mailman chant…

Holly Holliday is some sort of evil genius, even if the thought of her deliberately failing the Cheerio's to mess with Coach Sylvester is borderline terrifying, because if she could do it to them, then what's to stop her failing him. Well apart from glee, he really needs to study more with Will, because this is freaking him out big time.

Ok those grades have seriously got to climb….

Quinn is completely unreasonable, bitchy, cruel and cold and she's constantly freaking ragging on him, telling him not to think, not to have an opinion, trying to control every damn aspect of his fucking life. So maybe saying he wished she was more like Rachel was a bad move, because she goes all schizo and paranoid and thinks he's going to cheat on her with Rachel.

But it's not like he could just tell her that he wishes she was more like Will, that she could listen, could give a damn about how he feels, how he's dealing with this, or not managing to deal with it because he just can't fucking deal with this shit now.

So let her toss her accusations about cheating on her with Rachel, at least she won't be calling him out on being gay for Will and confused and terrified and angry and guilty and everything else that's building up inside of him.

Let her think what she wants.

It's not like she won't anyway.

Illegal jam sessions are fun, probably because they're not meant to happen at all, and if they're jamming and he's drumming, well he wont be trying not to check Will out when he's dancing. It sucks when they end, because this whole split up thing is complete bullshit.

It's no surprise that Quinn pitches a bitch fit about Rachel and Finn getting the leads for their song, even if she has one of those eye contact conversations with Will during the number, and that dig about swaying in the background like props, that was totally uncalled for.

Not as out of line as the anti minority bullshit, because seriously Brittany's like the poster child for all American girls and Puck could be any all American guy, well if he didn't have the mohawk making him look all badass and thug like.

He's definitely not imagining the look that Will shoots at Quinn on the way out, or the way she can't look him in the face. What the hell ?

This secrecy thing is a bitch so yeah, he manages to track down Will when he's in the gym kicking the shit out of the heavy bag, he's willing to risk seeing Will all hot and shirtless if it means he gets a fucking clue about what's going on.

Will isn't shirtless, which is a good news, bad news thing, good because his brain won't melt, but bad because he's not shirtless and Finn can't ogle him, it's fucked up wanting two different things at the same time.

" Hey Finn, did you need something ? " Will asks before he spins into one of those roundhouse kicks, making it look effortless, like it's no big deal.

" Uh yeah dude, I want to know what's going on with you and Quinn. I see you guys looking at each other all the time and I know she's slipping you notes. I know something's going on, and I want to know what it is, cus you're my friend and she's my girl and I trust you both but it's weirding me out. "

Will turns to look at Finn and nods, before dropping to the ground and motioning for Finn to come closer.

" You're right, we've been swapping notes and stuff, she called over the weekend about the sonogram thing because she thought you guys could use a ride, apparently you're not a great driver when you freak out. Then when Sue started messing with glee, we started arguing about that in our notes. I told you Santana, Britt and Quinn were Sue's moles, and now she's split up the club and she's picking us off by playing the minority card. Trying to stir up trouble and make us compete and hate each other. I was trying to get Quinn to tell me what it was about, but it's obvious now, Sue's using divide and conquer on us. "

Finn frowns, " If Brittany and Santana are moles, how come they're happy in glee, I know them and I've seen them both happy, it's the real deal when they're singing, and why's she using a video game on us ? "

" That's divide and conquer Finn, not Command and conquer. It means you split up a team of powerful adversaries into two or more rival teams and let them weaken each other fighting among themselves, whilst you just sweep in at the end and mop up the remnants."

" That does sound like Coach Sylvester, so how do we stop her ? "

Will grins, " We don't really have to, she'll blow up at Holly soon and I know Kurt, Artie, Tina and Mercedes hate being divided like this, the others won't be happy about it either. Sue didn't get it, people think we're losers, but we're there for each other, and she doesn't get the idea of support or strength through unity. She won't win this time."

" Cool, oh yeah, there's one thing I gotta ask, how did you get that tape from Jacob, that guy guards his Dictaphone with his life. " Finn cocked his head, watching as Will blushed and made a face.

" I backed him into a corner of the restroom and distracted him, and you really don't want any more details than that, seriously, because I am repressing the hell out of that memory and wondering if my college fund will pay for therapy. Maybe Rachel can recommend me her therapist since the little skeeze still managed to get a pair of panties out of her. " Will shudders, glaring at Finn as he starts laughing his ass off.

" Dude, tell me you did not come on to Jacob Ben Israel, oh god that's gross and genius at the same time. "

" Finn, cut it out, I swear it's not funny! Finn!

Will was right, Sue does blow up and Holly and her are two damn steps away from a cat fight, seriously if they had a paddling pool full of Jell-O they could sell tickets. It's awesome, because as soon as he yell's enough, Mercedes jumps in and Rachel follows and they all storm out in a unified front, even if Quinn does trail behind and Will does look insufferably smug.

Huh, so Will likes to be on top, damn that came out wrong, Will likes to win. Finn is just not thinking about Will on top of him in any way shape or form.

Nuh- uh!

Really he's not.

Of course Coach Sylvester has to get in the last damn word, by letting the whole damn glee club know that she knows Quinn's pregnant. And Quinn goes into a total meltdown, and fuck, how the hell is he meant to help her with this? He sucks with crying people and seeing Quinn, his strong, controlled, self assured girlfriend breaking down like this,

It kind of breaks his heart.


	16. The Queen Bee's return

Kurt of course wastes absolutely no time in launching into his version of the Spanish Inquisition, drilling Will for every detail of last nights date/booty call, whatever you want to call it, of course it has to be done while he's primping in front of his locker. He really loves Kurt, seriously the guy's like a brother, but he is rather, out there at times.

" A sleepover on the second date, honestly you're bordering on slutty. " Kurt sniffs as he tweaks his scarf and examines his guy-liner, yes it makes his eyes pop, but it's a little elaborate for a Friday at school, in Will's opinion. Not that he'd dare mention that to Kurt, the sarcastic eye rolls and being accused of being a " benighted savage, with plebeian ideas of fashion, well that is not how he wants to start his day.

" His roommate sexiled him, I should just let him drive around town till 3 am when I could have him in my bed like a giant teddy bear ? " Will peers over Kurt's shoulder and flicks an errant curl out of his face. Wondering, not for the first time if he could perm his hair straight or something, the curls are getting old, not to mention Sue's started making lesbian hair jokes.

Kurt flicks an eyebrow at him and snorts. " You could buy a giant teddy bear, besides last time I checked a teddy bear didn't bend you backwards over a car hood and kiss you like he was trying to suck the air out of your lungs." Well yes, but giant teddy bears also don't result in amazing morning sex or offers to take you to Colombus and goof around. Speaking of goofing around, Kurt looks far too smug for Will's liking, let's change that shall we? He thinks with more than a smidge of mischief.

Will shrugs and flicks a speck of lint from Kurt's shoulders, " Or give you killer blow jobs, seriously I thought my brain had melted. " Kurt glares at him in the mirror and shudders, " Way too much information, honestly I swear you've turned over-sharing into an art form." Success!

Will grins and claps him on the shoulder, " Heh just wait till Burt tries to give you the talk, I thought his head was going to implode. " Hmm, should he tell Kurt about his plan to make Burt watch Brokeback Mountain and see him squirm, or possibly see his head explode ?

Kurt shudders before closing his locker and wandering off, " La, la, la, I'm not listening. " He sings as he walks away from Will. Okay, so he'll just file that idea away for later.

School sucks, mostly because he's thinking he really should have taken Brett up on his offer to ditch, math test be damned, but no, he had to be all responsible and shit, and to top it all off the damned test is a piece of cake.

Seriously, by now he could be in Colombus having lunch with Brett and geeking out over comics or something, or making out in a park, but no, here he is in McKinley trying not to scowl at the lamentable menu in the cafeteria and wondering how the hell they can make pasta look so unappealing. Ok looks like it's grilled chicken and a salad again. If this keeps up he's going to be as finicky an eater as Kurt.

Still there is one positive about moping about not going to Colombus and obsessing over the cafeteria food, it does mean that he doesn't think too much about Finn, which should be kind of a relief. Even if it does give him a funny little pang of something when he realises the fact at the end of the day.

Fuck, what is going on inside his fucking head, he's got a guy, why can't he get over this fucking crush?

He definitely doesn't even let himself think that maybe he doesn't want to. Because that's just crazy.

He finds himself at a loss for plans over the weekend, Kurt's hanging out with Mercedes, Tina and Brittany, so there's no way Will's going over there. Brett's going to some frat party that sounds like a one way trip to alcohol poisoning, and yeah it was nice of him to actually think of inviting Will, and even nicer that he didn't push when Will said no. Not that the prospect of hanging around with hot college guys is unappealing but mooching around a party sober and watching all those hot college guys get drunk off their asses and do body shots, well it makes him decidedly uneasy.

Not that body shots are unappealing, licking salt off a cute guy would be fun, it's the shots he objects to, because there is no damn way he's going to turn out like his folks, especially if it's true and alcoholism can be genetic.

So yeah, he has no plans, nothing more elaborate than checking the net for some Bleach fan subs, maybe track down a few mp3's of his missing songs, maybe see if he cant track down that Slingbacks single or something

Still it's nice to not have to do anything for once, his dad will deal with his own breakfast, and feed his mom when she emerges from her alcoholic stupor. So he can kick back and relax all day, which is what he thinks until he opens his hotmail and finds an email from Quinn.

So, there goes his quiet weekend…

Quinn is, not to put it lightly, a complete bitch, but she is his friend even with the shunning at school, and he can get why she's a freakin' nightmare. The Fabray's are ultra conservative, they're so devout that they're practically televangelists, they insisted on Quinn being in the celibacy club, being a cheerleader. They're so damn caught up in their religious WASP, all american preconceptions that they've forced their daughter into a mould, not caring too much if fits her or not.

So yeah, add in teenage hormones, pregnancy hormones, the stresses of trying to keep good grades, peer pressure of high school and trying to keep up her status as the HBIC of McKinley, and he gets why she's a bitch. It makes him kind of glad that he didn't end up dating Quinn, because he's pretty sure he'd be bald from ripping his hair out in frustration.

So yeah, she vents and rants and he does his best to calm her down and not just end up IM'ing " Don't be such a bitch." fifty million times. He finds himself talked into giving her a ride to her sonogram appointment with Finn next week and offering any moral support he can.

So yeah Saturday is a bust. Fuck, that party with Brett might have been better than having to spend all day talking down an irritable teenage cheerleader who's pregnant. So much for a quiet weekend….

Sunday more than makes up for it, when he gets a voicemail from an exceptionally hungover Brett.

" I think someone switched my eyes with red hot marbles ? I need ice cream and sympathy and coffee, dear god I need coffee, call me ? "

The abject misery and sheer oh-god-why-did-I-do-this-to-myself that echoes down the phone line makes Will smile, but not as much as the thought that he was the first person Brett called. The urge to smirk and tell him " I told you so. " is at war with the urge to coo over him and be all sympathetic.

The sympathy wins, which is why he texts Brett to meet him at Foundry park and bring a blanket.

Brett looks truly miserable, dark hollows under his eyes, unshaven and his eyes are so bloodshot that it does look almost like someone took them clean out of his head, superheated them and dropped them back in. He sits hunched on his blanket near the edge of the lake, a picture of abject misery, at least until Will joins him on the blanket, then he groans and drags Will into a hug.

" Those frat boys are insane, I think they were trying to kill us with tequila, so many body shots, and don't start me on getting tequila shots with a worm in it. I woke up and thought someone had laid carpet in my mouth and crapped on it, and my eyes, god Will, my eyes. " Brett whines, burying his head in the crook of Will's neck.

It takes a superhuman effort not to burst into laughter, but Will manages it, shifting so that Brett's weight doesn't push him flat on his back. The blonde seems to calm down and relax whilst Will rubs circles into his back and runs his fingers through his hair.

" Okay, I think it's time for us to fix you up. " Will murmurs, smiling fondly as Brett looks up at him with a puzzled look. Will chuckles and grabs his backpack.

" You look like hell, you're still hungover and I can help with that. Ok first, you're going to drink this, it's just water and some soluble aspirin, then you're going to take a couple of these vitamin B12 pills and chill out for a while, then we'll go get ice cream, or lunch or something. "

Brett manages a feeble grin, " You're an angel in human form, seriously. "

" Nah, angels only wish they looked this good. Drink up and then we'll snuggle till you can keep something solid down. The sun's shining, the birds are singing and it's a nice day to just relax. Get to it blondie. "

" Ok curly. " Brett murmurs before chugging down the water and the vitamins. Flopping back onto the blanket gracelessly when he's done, scrunching his eyes shut as the sun has the temerity to get in his face.

" Ok, big flaw in the plan, I don't have any shades. " He whines.

" I think I can remedy that. " Will snickers before rolling himself on top of Brett and catching his lips in a kiss. Brett moans contentedly as the sunlight stopped torturing his eyes and Will's hands began running through his hair in a sensual counterpoint to his kissing.

When they broke for air he felt Will's lips curve up in a smile. " Better? "

" Lil Bit. "

" Guess I'll have to keep going then. "

" I like this hangover cure. "

" Less talking more kissing. "

" Yes sir. " He breathed before Will's lips fastened on his again.

Old people are prudish and lame, seriously, who has a problem seeing two cute young guys making out in a park? Answer, bigoted old blue haired women in Lima. Will had no idea what her freaking problem was but the old biddy was making such a scene that it was easier to just leave the park and drag a highly amused, giggly Brett out of the park in search of food, well for food read ice cream, as Brett swore it was now the second best hangover cure in the world, having to concede that Will's was better than a double scoop of chocolate ice cream.

Of course then he had to go and get all distracted and porny over ice cream cones and watching Will licking away at his cone, which resulted in him going all caveman and dragging Will into an alley after they finished in the store. With the end result of Brett on his knees giving Will another one of those killer blow jobs that turned his world inside out.

" Holy shit, you're trying to kill me with blow jobs. "

" You're trying to drive me crazy with porny ice cream moves. "

" It's how you eat ice cream, unless you get a tub. "

" It's hot, you are completely forbidden from ever ordering tubs of ice cream ever. " The blonde muttered as he refastened Will's jeans.

" Way to go all Alpha male. Now shut up and get those pants off, I have a favour to return. " Will growled as he fisted Brett's shirt in his hand and dragged him closer.

Brett may not have been hungover by the time he headed back to his apartment, but he was certainly tired and sleepy for other reasons.

Lazy kisses in the park and ice cream, well they just became Will's favourite thing to do on a Sunday.

Of course then it's Monday and school, and it's the same boring routine that it always is, except now he's getting messages from Quinn slipped into his locker as she obsessively double checks and triple checks facts about pregnancy and check ups, and someone really needs to teach that girl how to google effectively, even if she has to use a school pc.

She's draining and demanding, and he's really, really, really glad that he's not dating her, he dodged a fucking bullet there…

Then it's the day of the sonogram and she's even more bitchy than usual and Finn's a nervous wreck, and yeah, this is definitely why Quinn asked him for help, because she's a road rage incident waiting to happen and Finn would probably wrap them around a tree.

The things he does for friends, well friends and awkward crushes….

Jacob Ben Israel is creepy.

Not that this is a surprise, Will still remembers the little creep blogging about his breakup with Brittany. So when he sees him hanging around Rachel, he does toy with the idea of rescuing her, before deciding against it, mostly because he's still feeling the urge to lock her in a janitors closet himself.

Of course that's when the universe decides to fuck with him " …it's about Quinn Fabray, word on the street is that she's in trouble…"

_Shit_

" Because the same birdy told me, you're heartbroken that Finn Hudson didn't choose you to carry his litter."

Rachel, bless her hideous knee high socks at least heads back to him, but Will's not letting this one slide. He manages to sidestep a bunch of freshman and intercept Jacob before Rachel even manages to finish the word What.

The girl is an idiot, you don't bargain with muckrakers like Jacob, because it never ends. So Will snags the creepy little gossip by the arm, nods to Rachel and frogmarches Jacob to the nearest restroom." Jacob, Jacob, Jacob, we really need to have a little chat regarding that mouth of yours." He murmurs as he firmly pushes the skinny gossip into the restroom.

" Y-you don't scare me, everyone knows you're not violent unless someone starts anything. " Jacob splutters, which would be a lot more convincing if he hadn't backed himself into a corner, holding onto his Dictaphone like it's a life-line.

" Oh really, Jacob. " Will mutters as he invades his space, breath ghosting across Jacobs neck, even as he snakes one of his legs between Jacobs, and yup the little creeps hard, whether it's due to Rachel, or just a hormonal reaction to someone being this close to him, it doesn't matter though because it gives Will the ammunition he needs.

" Someone's excited, now where were we ? " He murmurs against Jacobs ear, grinding his thigh into Jacobs crotch until he whimpers. " Ah yes, you and that big…mouth of yours. " He grinds against Jacob again feeling the smaller guy grind against his thigh insistently. " These idle rumours of yours could draw attention from the wrong kind of people Jacob. "

Jacob grinds up against him harder, needy little whines escaping his mouth as he grinds against Will's leg. Grip loosening on that Dictaphone of his as he ruts insistently again and again and again. " And by the wrong type of people, I mean people who won't be anywhere as…accommodating as I am. You think that things are difficult now. " He moans into Jacobs ear, " Imagine what would happen if the Queen Bee herself heard what you're saying about her, do you really want to be dumpstered three times a day, or perhaps you enjoy hanging from a flagpole during a patriotic wedgie. "

Jacobs grip on the Dictaphone faltered as he moaned and thrust against Will's leg one more time. Will snatched it from his hand and flipped it open, grabbing the cassette and handing the Dictaphone back to Jacob. He yanked a couple of paper towels from the dispenser and handed them to the gossip. " Now if I were you Jacob, I would avoid any idle speculation about Quinn, because you do not want the Cheerio's or jocks coming after you. Or Coach Sylvester. "

It's kind of creepy and a cliché, but he managed to get a straight guy off, which may or may not account for the little swagger in his step on the way out. Which lasst for about five minutes until he realises he pretty much had sex with Jacob Ben Israel, urgh, now he wonders if he can manage to blow off Spanish for a very thorough shower.

Sue is such a cliché, going for the minority approach. Divide and Conquer, seriously? Sue's kids are going to be tough to compete with, because she does have a point, they are scarily talented. Even if the thought of Sue being right in any way, shape or form does make Will want to throw up a little. Holly does tend to overlook everyone in favour of Finn and Rachel.

Quinn's still managing to keep her HBIC mask in place, but there's definitely a flicker of guilt when he throws her a " What the hell ! " look.

Someone really should warn Rachel how guys like Jacob work, because seriously she really should know better than to cave in and hand the guy a pair of her panties. And after he did what he did to put Jacob off. The universe is clearly out to mess with him…

Failing the Cheerio's, it's genius! Completely fraudulent, because Will knows that Britt, Santana and Quinn aren't the only cheerleaders with good grades, he can name half a dozen of them who should still be eligible, clearly Holly's a secret evil genius.

Mind you if she's using grades as a weapon then Finn had better watch out. He really needs to make sure their study sessions continue, and it has absolutely nothing to do with the fact that he'd like to lick melted chocolate from Finn's chest.

Porn tube websites have a lot to answer for…

This split club thing isn't going to last, because Tina, Artie, Mercedes and Kurt are not down with this. Kurt is especially vocal about not having Will around to help back up his suggestions. Yeah sure he has Mercedes and Tina, but they've never faced down Santana when she's on a power kick. Sure the jam sessions are fun, because they're taboo, but afterwards kind of sucks, especially when it comes to him trying to stop Quinn from enabling Sue.

Which is a losing battle, Quinn's stubborn and holds her ground and she really believes in Sue, which is incredibly dumb, because come on, if she can try and manipulate Will and trash him like she did, then why does Quinn think she's going to get any more leeway than he did?

She really should know better. And pulling that minority bullshit with Puckerman and Brittany, that is so out of line. Especially when Britt is actually naïve enough to believe it and Puckerman, well he does fit into the dumb jock mould far too well sometimes, seriously if Holly really was anti-semitic then she would be anti Rachel.

Sometimes he hates the way people just don't think!

Finn has been thinking, which is a welcome change from his usual casual, ambling through life mentality. It also leads to Will having to explain the principle of Divide and Conquer to him, while trying not to laugh his ass off at Finn thinking it was a video game.

It also leads to Finn laughing his ass off when he figures out exactly how Will distracted Jacob Ben Israel. Which is a whole new level of mortifying having your cute friend/crush laughing at you because you sort of seduced a gossip-mongering geek to kill a story about his head cheerleader girlfriend being pregnant.

You couldn't make this shit up if you tried…

That whole theory about Sue and Holly having an adversarial relationship because they used to be lovers, it's starting to gain credence in Will's head, because when two people fight with that level of passion and intensity, well it's clearly not just about feuding co-workers.

He's not sure whether it's a turn on or not, yes it's girl on girl action, but thinking of Sue and sex, well it misfire something in his brain. When someone does finally speak up and call them out on their bullshit it's Finn. Finally manning up and being their leader.

It's about time. So maybe he's a little smug as they all storm out en masse, but hey it's a joy to see Sue's schemes fall apart on her. Maybe it's petty but whatever, he's only human.

Working with Rachel Berry on something that isn't glee related, well he didn't see that coming. But when Sue dropped her little bomb about Quinn's situation being all over the blogosphere, well it was kind of a race to see who'd track down Jacob and give him hell. Rachel ends up giving him the tongue lashing of his life and Will backs her up as the intimidating muscle.

Sue told him to run the story, yeah why isn't he surprised. Well he can't in all good conscience do anything to Jacob, but he sure as hell doesn't warn him when he sees Mike, Matt and Puck bearing down on him with Slushies.

It kind of makes him feel better when he hears Jacob's yelp from around the corner.


	17. Blood and Vodka

There are a couple of downsides to being an supportive friend and relatively nice guy. One of them is actually being there for your friends, and now that Quinn's pregnant and hysterical and hormonal, well he has to be there for her. And Finn too.

Although it turns out that being there for Quinn mostly involves keeping her supplied with Kleenex when she's in one of her marathon crying sessions, feeding her what seems like her own body weight in ice cream and bacon and listening to her bitching about how she's ruined her life and she's going to be that slut who got knocked up by the quarterback for the rest of her life, even after she gets rid of the kid.

By the end of that first weekend Will is tired, stressed out, has had no contact at all with Brett and is wondering if he should just buy painkillers in bulk because dealing with all of this shit's giving him a headache that borders on Migraine levels of painful.

Being a good friend can kind of suck.

He ends up at Kurt's early the next morning, because he knows Burt has some hellishly strong painkillers, plus he could use some of his rocket fuel coffee since he didn't sleep at all last night, dreaming of a giant baby shaped monster made out of ice cream chasing after him and throwing bacon at him.

Of course telling Burt and Kurt this makes Kurt choke on his grapefruit and Burt blow coffee through his nose. Which is great, at least until all the laughing he does makes his brain feel like it's rattling around in his head and he prays the painkillers take effect soon.

Thankfully he feels almost human by the time he leaves for school with Kurt. He just has to make it through the day and see what insanity Holly has in store for them today.

The madness begins just before glee.

Most of the jocks are kind of dumb, not out and out stupid, but not very smart. However when it comes down to bullying they're kind of evil geniuses. Take Slushie facials for example, they never throw them on the first target they come across, they draw out the suspense, like they feed on the fear of a face full of cold sticky slush. Generally they end up throwing on the third pass, the fourth if they're patient.

Not that Will worries about being Slushied, the memory of Azimio doubled over and blowing chunks is still fresh in the collective memories of the jocks. Kurt doesn't get Slushied either because he has immunity under Will's decree of I-will-fucking-destroy-you-if you-try it. It also helps that some of the jocks have seen him beating the crap out of the heavy bag. Funny how they've stopped calling him Anklegrabber lately…

So Finn being Slushied by Karofsky is completely unexpected, because he's the Quarterback, it's the equivalent of being the King. It's not supposed to happen, but Karofsky's declaration of Finn and Quinn not having the juice anymore, it's out there now. Which means that people are going to listen to it.

Shit, this is bad.

Finn and Quinn have no idea how to deal with a Slushie attack, trying to clean it off with a towel just won't work, and that stuff burns your eyes like you wouldn't believe. They're going to have to learn the importance of spare clothing and eye drops, moist towelletes and on the really bad days a bottle of shampoo and a towel. Most of which Will has in his locker, yeah sure he's not a target anymore but it's just common sense to be prepared for the worst.

Things do pick up when Holly asks them to find a suitable song to mash up with bust-a-move. He kind of has a weakness for Young MC, well late eighties, early nineties hip hop in general. Oh who's he kidding he's a complete music slut, and with Finn out of commission and Puckerman not being in the mood, well he can go all out.

He can hear Kurt's groan as Artie starts playing the bass and can hear Tina's giggle. He's going to get severely mocked later but right now it's time to just cut loose and sing, and dance, and incidentally show Mike that he may be the master of pop'n lock but Will can hold his own.

He's not threatened by Mike and his crazy non-existent bones, nu-uh, no way. Well, maybe a little, but he'll deal with it. When he thinks about it later his favourite part of just going for it is the look of faint disdain and embarrassment on Kurt's face.

The nod of respect from Mike, well that's just the icing on the cake,

Things with his mom have been, well a little off. He'll be fixing dinner and she'll just look at him as she sips on her booze of choice, it's, well actually he's not at all sure what kind of look it is. Honestly he's not used to her paying him any attention except when she calls for another bottle of wine or asks if dinner's ready yet.

Even when his dad was drinking he interacted more with Will than his mom did. It's kind of depressing that his mom's practically a stranger in his life. But what the hell do you do in this kind of situation? It's not like there are rules for this.

Besides it's not like she'd remember much of it if they did talk, not when she's still drinking.

Still, those looks, well they make him kind of uneasy. Even if he can't figure out why.

He hears about the ultimatum the next day. What the hell is that about? Why are Tanaka and Holly up in each others faces all of a sudden? It's crazy, almost as crazy as Puckerman actually taking initiative and preparing a solo.

It kind of kills Will to admit it, but the guy's actually quite good. If he keeps this up then Will's going to actually think he has a soul and isn't a complete dick.

Which would pretty much turn the world on it's head.

The football team are dicks, the gang-Slushie they bestow on Finn and Quinn is appalling. Will actually manages to get Tina to help Quinn in the girls restroom whilst he attends to a morose, shell-shocked Finn who's just standing in the men's room watching as the Slushie runs down his striped polo shirt and soaks into his undershirt.

It's a really good thing Will had all that stuff in his locker. "Strip." He orders Finn, laying out a towel and a spare t-shirt of his along with his other supplies. Finn looks up at him dopily, frowning a little. "Dude?"

"Your shirts are going to need to soak, grape is a bitch for staining, plus if you don't wash off the syrup you'll be sticky all day, so strip and wash off and I'll give your shirts a quick rinse. We'll get the syrup out of your hair and your eyes as well and there's a spare shirt for you there, it might be a little big on you but it'll do."

Finn blushes and turns away as he peels off his sticky polo and undershirt, handing them to Will blindly before he starts washing off the tacky syrup. "I dunno if I can handle this." He mutters. Will looks across from where he's soaking those shirts.

"Handle what?" He asks, trying for neutral.

"Being Slushied, having to choose between football and glee. I-I don't want to be a loser Will, football's my ticket out of here, but I like singing. I don't know, what do I choose?" He huffs in frustration looking across at Will who shrugs.

Finn groans as he runs the cold tap and dunks his head in the sink, starting slightly when he feels the towel pressed into his hands. "It's your choice Finn. No one can make it for you." Will murmurs as he wrings out Finn's shirts. Finn peers at him from under the towel and sighs. "You're not helping." He whines. Will shrugs again before continuing. "That's because you have to do this one yourself. It's not my life, it's yours. Do what makes you happy. If it's football then it's football, if it's singing then it's singing, but it's your choice."

Finn slumps, defeated. Only for Will to tilt his head up and watch those big brown eyes widen before he administers the eye drops. Chuckling softly as Finn winces. "I know, it's kind of nasty, but it'll stop the burning. Your shirts are fine, they just need to dry."

Finn's still blinking away the eye drops when Will gathers up his stuff and leaves.

He's not surprised that Finn doesn't choose glee. Sad, slightly annoyed that he didn't take his advice, because Will's seen him on the field, and Will's seen him sing, and he knows what Finn enjoys more. But the lure of popularity and peer pressure were obviously too much for Finn to resist.

Which kind of sucks because Mike, Matt and even Puckerman chose glee. It's just sad, but he won't interfere and he sure as hell won't pressure Finn when they study that night. He's just disappointed that Finn would shelve what he wants in favour of what other people think he should want.

His mom's drunk when he gets home that afternoon. On vodka. She's bitter and vindictive and incoherent, she's not even forming words as she storms her way around the house, shrieking and smashing things, it's terrifying, because he's never, never seen her like this.

It gets worse because he's barely in the door, only just registering what's going on before there's a blur and something smashes into his face, literally, there's a wash of pain as his cheek's cut open by the bottle of vodka and a burn as it shatters and floods the wound with spirits.

Which is when his mom stops shrieking, freezes where she is for one moment, drinking in what she's done before she claps a hand to her mouth and runs through the kitchen and out through the kitchen door into the back yard.

Will can't register anything other than the pain in his face and the burn of the alcohol in it, he doesn't even react until he feels the trickling of blood running down his jaw. She threw a bottle at him. His mom, threw a bottle of vodka at his head. Deliberately. Never mind that she was drunk, never mind that she was a shrieking incoherent mess.

His mom hurt him, and she meant to do it.

He stumbles out of the house, messenger bag and it's contents forgotten as he heads to Kurt's house, barely aware of the way he's shaking or the way he pounds on the door until Kurt opens it and gasps in horror before pulling Will into the house and leading him to the couch, pulling Will against him until his face is buried in the folds of Kurt's shirt. Holding onto him tight until the shaking stops and the tears come and never once complaining about the blood soaking into his shirt.

It's all Will knows until everything just goes black.

"This can't go on George, you saw what she did to him."

"I know, don't you think I don't know Burt, but what do I do exactly? Call the cops, get Dorothy arrested? Fuck, what happens if they try to take Will into care, I don't know how to handle this."

The voices are loud, and annoying, not as annoying as the dull throbbing in his face, but almost. "You handle it quietly, because I swear if either of you wake him up I'll give you the tongue lashing of your life." Kurt hisses venomously.

Kurt, Burt, his dad.

His mom.

He shudders as the memory rolls over him and Kurt's arms tighten on him reflexively. "You're safe. We've got you. Breathe Will, breathe." Kurt's looking down at him, stroking his hair, when Will finally screws up the courage to open his eyes. Kurt smiles weakly and Burt's hand claps Will's shoulder awkwardly, because this is a cluster-fuck of a situation and he's clueless.

Will's dad eases onto the sofa and Kurt disentangles himself from Will allowing George to take his place. His arms lock around Will as if he never wants to let go and his grips tight, a constant stream of "I'm sorry's" spilling from his lips as he holds Will and rocks him like a kid on Burt and Kurt's couch.

It's the smell of his dad that finally calms him down, a smell he hasn't really thought of in years, Brylcreem and Old Spice, a touch of his body spray and that Ivory soap he uses. Will hasn't been held like this in years. Not since the day his dad clung to him like an anchor when his parents died, not since before everything got fucked up and dysfunctional and all kinds of messed up.

He just wants the world to stop, so he can stay here, like this and not have to move. Ever again. Not to have to deal with stupid school and crushes and friends who need him or want him to tell them what to do. He just wants to be in this moment and never come out of it. Because he's safe here and for once he lets go of everything and just lets his dad look after him for once.

It takes an hour before they all calm down enough to actually do anything. Kurt and Burt head to Will's to grab a change of clothes and his messenger bag. George still won't let go of Will but he and Burt agreed that the four of them would stay at the Hummel household that night. Will, well he's just tired. His face hurts and Burt's painkillers haven't kicked in yet. Kurt's done a great job of cleaning him up when he clung to him like a limpet. The cut on his face isn't deep enough to scar, but it's surrounded by a bruise that takes up most of his cheek. It's sore but it doesn't feel like anything's broken and there's no way he's going to hospital.

There's no way he's calling the cops either, because he remembers the look on his mom's face as she ran off, the combination of horror and realisation of what she'd done before she ran off. George is grateful, Kurt is tight lipped regarding his refusal to call the cops and Burt is in full on, protective, Papa-Bear mode.

"You can't just do nothing Will." He says, pacing in frustration.

"I'm not doing nothing, when she shows up we're going to sit down and set up some sort of counselling sessions, AA meetings, drying out clinics, whatever works." Will argues wearily.

"It's never worked before." Burt snaps irritably.

"I know, but she's never got this much of a wake up call before. You didn't see her freak out when she saw what she'd done."

"She ran away and left you."

"She freaked out Burt, she wasn't thinking any more clearly than I was when I came to the house. I'm not going to set the cops on her."

"Have you seen your face? How can you just let this slide." Burt implores him.

"Yes, I've seen my face, but it's just a cut, it won't even scar. I've had worse in sparring matches with Miguel. I'm letting this slide because my mom needs help. Help that she won't get in the drunk tank or the police cells. Don't ask me to call the cops on my mom for an accident."

Burt looks at Will dumbfounded. "That's not an accident." He said flatly.

Will flashed him a crooked grin, "Have you seen her aim Burt? There's no way she could hit me on purpose."

Burt crossed over to the couch and knelt before Will, hands on his shoulders. "I care about you kid, you're like a second son to me. You get this one, but if anything like this ever happens again I will call the cops myself and make sure she's in cuffs and a jail cell personally." He looked into Will's eyes, satisfied that he had gotten his point across. Will nodded. "I have to give her a chance Burt. She's my mom."

Burt sighed as he stood up and nodded. "I don't like it, but I get it."

Will leaned back against his father and closed his eyes. "I love you too Burt. You're like a second father to me."

Burt groaned, "You had to go and get all mushy on me, didn't you kid?"

Will shrugged. "I figure we're due a mushy moment."

Kurt snickered, "Well mushy moments aside we still have to eat. Everybody sit down and I'll order Chinese." With those words Kurt managed to dissipate the last of the tension as the guys realised just how hungry they actually were.

He's not surprised that he has to argue, fucking argue, to go to school the next day. Yeah okay it's a fucked up situation but hiding at home won't do anyone any good, besides if he's at school then he won't have to deal with his mom showing up and having to deal with everything. He won't have to try and figure things out.

He's in no rush to do that.

So he pretty much ignores the offer of a day off and as much of Burt's junk food stash as he can eat whilst overdosing on musicals. He insists on going to school and he wins. Mostly due to Kurt not siding with either of their dads, because if he'd insisted then Will would probably have ended up caving in and nesting in Kurt's basement like a hibernating dormouse.

Kurt doesn't even hesitate before slipping one of Will's cd's into the Navigator's sound system. It's reassuring and just what he needs, a little normality. Even if their version of normality happens to be right in the middle of this kind of weirdness.

Will's pretty sure that if he didn't have Kurt and Burt on his side that he'd be even more fucked up than he is. Of course thinking like this isn't helping anyone, especially with the whole damned day to get through.

Of course there are looks, and Tina and Artie wince visibly when they see him, not that it's a surprise, the bruise on his face is a particularly nasty purple, with the cut barely visible as a thin line of red. It's hot and throbbing and Burt refused to let him have any more of those painkillers, turns out they're addictive. Will felt the urge to just laugh and shrug, he's the kid of addicts, he's bound to get hooked on something sooner or later, right?

There are looks of shock and betrayal as he idly listens to Kurt and Rachel gossip in the hallways and hears them gasp before he turns to see Finn hovering nervously in front of Kurt, Finn with a Slushie in his hand.

Kurt looks at him with a resigned stare and sighs. "Do it." He says, almost laconically whilst Rachel tries to bore holes in Finn's head with her gaze.

"I don't want to, I know you're really picky about what products you use on your face." Finn whines.

"But you've been getting so much pressure from the gorilla's on the football team. I guess they didn't appreciate me resigning from the team and choosing glee." Kurt muses, almost as if he's not about to be Slushied.

"Probably would have went over better if you didn't announce it in the showers." Finn nods, looking indecisive and reluctant. Tina and Artie watch in relative silence whilst Mercedes verbally lashes out at Finn. "You are not gonna Slushie on my man Kurt." She says, as if it's a declaration of fact, as if it could never happen.

Rachel can't help but add her scorn, "Why wouldn't he, he's made his choice. He doesn't care about us losers anymore." Which produces a visible wince from Finn. "That's not true, it's, if I don't do it the guys on the team are gunna kick the crap out of me."

Which is when Kurt shoots him an irritable glance and mutters, "Well we can't have that can we." and takes the Slushie from Finn's hand. "What are you doing? " Asks the Quarterback, only for Kurt to glare imperiously at him, "It's called taking one for the team." He snarks at Finn before throwing the Slushie over himself.

Or trying to, because Will's hand is clamped over the big plastic cup, holding it in place. "You are such a drama queen. If you think for one second that I'm letting you Slushie yourself then you're crazy, especially since I had to wait two hours in the damned mall for you to pick that scarf. I'm not having you ruin it now." Will eases the cup from Kurt's hands and throws the sticky frigid slush over his own face, hearing all of the gathered gleeks gasp in horror. He hands the empty cup over to Finn who looks completely shell shocked before he turns to Kurt. "I'll start on the clean up, bring me my stuff from my locker okay?"

The last thing he hears before vanishing to the nearest restroom is Kurt bitching at Finn. "Now get out of here, and take some time to think whether or not any of your friends on the football team would have done that for you."

Knowing the football team it's a pretty safe bet the answer would be no.

For once the Slushie didn't entirely suck, if nothing else the ice eased the pain from his face. The clean up is much faster than usual as Kurt not only grabbed Will's anti-slushie kit, but also his high end face wipes. There's not a lot that they can do about drying Will's hair, not without him missing class and spending the time hunched under a hand dryer.

"Still crushing?" Kurt asks as he towels Will's head viciously.

"Damned thing won't shift." Will mumbles from beneath the towel.

"Hmm, I'm glad I'm not plagued with that particular hormone induced madness." Kurt sniffs.

"Yet." Will chuckles, which Kurt answers with a particularly harsh rub of the towel.

"Honestly, Puberty is overrated. All of this just for sexual maturity. Childhood was a lot simpler." Kurt laments before checking on Will's hair. "Well it's not ideal but it'll do, and on the plus side you can't smother your head in obscene amounts of gel till you get home." Beams Kurt.

Will groans as he checks his uncontrolled mop of curls in the mirror. "Seriously considering shaving my head." He moans as Kurt whips out a brush and his hairspray. "I don't know if you could pull it off sweetie, maybe just cut down on the gel a little, maybe we could perm your hair straight. Let me work on my googling later and we'll see."

Will blinked under Kurt's hairspray barrage before he looked at him. "If this some plan to get me to let you near me with those hair straighteners again I'm not falling for it." Kurt muttered something distinctly nasty under his breath and Will smirked. "Thanks for the help."

Kurt shrugged and began to gather up their supplies. "Thanks for the Slushie-vention. Grape is particularly offensive. I would have done it though, just to prove a point."

"I know but you shouldn't have to, besides the ice helped my face. I can't believe Burt cut me off from his painkiller stash." Will bitched.

"Yes well, drug are bad mmm'kay?" Kurt grinned. Will just rolled his eyes and laughed. "Okay Mr Mackie, come on let's get to class."

Will's not keen on heading straight home, the fact that it's a Friday notwithstanding. He's not sure whether he could handle seeing his mom right now, if she's even shown her face. So he beats the crap out of the heavy bag and just falls into his usual rhythm where everything just flows and the world narrows to him and the bag.

Of course it's the gym and Finn does seem to have a way of ending up in there when he's working out. With anyone else he might be annoyed and pissy, but that damn crush and the fact that Finn is a decent guy at heart, well it ameliorates his pissed off tendencies.

"Hey Will."

"Won't you get shunned for talking to me? Tanaka will make you run laps for breaking ranks." Ok so maybe he's a little pissed, but he's not punching him.

"I talked to the Coach, he's going to scrap that Thursday practice. I told him I didn't want to choose, that I shouldn't have to. If I'm the quarterback I should be calling the plays and making my own choices. It's like you said, I should do what I want, what makes me happy. Kurt was right too, none of the other guys on the team would take a Slushie for me, hell for each other."

Will turned around and gave Finn an appraising look. "That's because most of the football team are morons with a tendency towards casual cruelty and the intellectual capabilities of a salt covered slug. I'm glad your making your own decisions Finn."

Finn flashed that lopsided grin of his, "Dude, decision making is like hard. Why do you think I asked you what to do? I'm terrified I'm going to fuck up. You're like one of the most together guys I know. Even if you did blow me off last night, seriously dude what happened to your face?"

Will closed his eyes and drew in a deep breath. "It's personal. It's, I - I don't talk about this stuff with anyone other than Kurt. It's embarrassing and fucked up and dysfunctional and I just can't talk about it. Sorry I blew you off, but stuff happened, and it's kind of unresolved." He opened his eyes and shrugged, only to see Finn nodding sympathetically.

"I get it, I mean I get so wrapped up in the whole Quinn thing that I forget other people have stuff going on too. But if you do wanna talk about it, well I'm cool with that." He flashed that lopsided grin again before he looked at his watch and groaned. "I gotta split, Quinn'll kill me if I don't give her a ride home.

Later dude."

Will nodded. "Later Finn."

There's only so long you can put off going home, and Will finally had to give in and head home. When he got in the door he sighed at the silence. At least if it's quiet his mom's not trashed. He toyed with heading straight up to his room but decided to snag a soda and wait and see if his mom had turned up or was still AWOL.

It was when he sat at the kitchen table that he heard his parents talking in his dad's study.

"Dorothy please, don't do this, we can work things out." His dad sounds panicked and sad and just plain tired.

"Come on George, we both know that's not true." His mom sounds sober, tired and bitter, but sober.

"We're a family." George pleads.

"No, we're not. We haven't been a family in years. We're three strangers living in the same house. Will isn't even our son anymore, he's our caretaker more than anything else. Can you tell me his favourite colour, what his favourite movie is? I can't. He deserves better George, you both do." She sounds so tired, so raw, that Will winces almost as hurt by the sheer weariness in her voice as he was by the bottle she hurled.

"You think leaving us is better? How does that help anyone, tell me Doodle, because I just don't get it. You're not making any damn sense." He's pleading now.

"It's better because I won't be here, I won't see him, I won't resent my own son for trapping me as a housewife and a mother, I won't feel like a fucking failure because I don't love my own child. I won't keep wishing that I'd ignored Maria and had that abortion when I found out I was pregnant. I won't have to drown myself in cheap booze to stop myself from wanting to hurt him. I threw that bottle at him last night deliberately, because I don't love him, I never have. That's why it'll be better." She shrieked.

"You don't mean that, you can't mean that. Why are you saying this?" Will's dad sounds almost broken now. He can hear thumping noises, probably the suitcases in the closet in the study he thinks distantly.

"I'm saying it because it's true George. We had so many plans, do you remember? You were going to become a lawyer and I was going to use my degree in Business. We were going to get jobs in Columbus and get the fuck out of Lima. Then I got pregnant, three weeks before we graduated. I wasn't going to tell you but Maria found the pregnancy test, she persuaded me to tell you. You were so damned happy and you told our folks. I had no choice after that, but I thought it would be okay. We'd have our kid and still end up in Columbus. We didn't though, because babies are expensive and you jumped into a job as an accountant, but I thought it would be worth it once the kid was born." She paused for a moment before continuing.

"It wasn't though because I didn't feel anything for him. I knew he was my son, I saw them clean him up and hand him to me but I didn't feel it. I thought maybe it was the pain meds, maybe it would pass. It didn't pass when he started crawling, or walking, or talking. It didn't pass when I'd sit in playgroups or pick him up from kindergarten. I'm still waiting to feel that love, that sense of connection that I'm supposed to feel, but I don't. I tried not to let it show, I faked everything the best that I could. It was enough because our folks and you, you all loved him really. I just had to fake it well enough so that no one noticed. Then they died on us. It broke us both, but it was a relief to know I could feel."

Will can hear his dad weeping now, the kind of messy snotty tears you never see in movies, he wants to get up and go to him, try and comfort him like his dad did for him last night. He just can't move, his legs won't work and he feels empty. Like someone's just scooped out his innards and left him there.

"We got drunk and lost it, remember? We bounced around Mexico city for two weeks and Maria and Miguel gave us hell. Then we came back and Will got on with stuff when we couldn't. He took over everything. He learned how to do laundry, cook, pay all our bills, shop for groceries and we let him. We let him do everything and I started to resent him, because he was a kid and he could deal with losing our family, he could keep himself together but we couldn't. The booze helped me deal with it, numbed me, stopped me resenting him as much, but it's still there George. It's always there! He's my son and I resent him, he's my son and I don't love him. He's my son and I want to hurt him. If I stay then I'm going to do something unforgivable and you deserve better, both of you do."

"What do I tell him? "Hi Will your mother's gone, she's had some crazy post-partum thing and has no positive feelings for you whatsoever?" It'll destroy him. Damn it Dorothy, what the hell do I say?" George sobs, croaking out the words.

"You don't have to say anything. I heard him come in, I heard him go into the kitchen. He's heard everything I said. All of it, he knows now." Dorothy says sighing. Will hears his dad shuffling out of the guest room, wiping his eyes on his sleeves, trying not to look like a hot mess. He sees his mom emerging from the guest room with their two big suitcases, she nods at him once and heads upstairs to his parents room.

George takes the seat next to Will and sighs before pulling him into a hug. "I had no idea. I knew we had problems with drinking, but this, this is beyond anything I could ever imagine. I thought she loved you, I thought she was happy until Chuck and Shannon died. I'm sorry. Fuck, I don't even know where we go from here."

Will shrugged, "Me either." He mumbled, still feeling empty, he wondered if this was what emotional shock felt like. Maybe google can help him. He sits beside his dad wrapped in his arms and just wonders what the hell he's supposed to do now.

Neither of them could say how long it takes for Dorothy to make her way down the stairs with her cases packed before she vanishes into the study and emerges with her passport and all her paperwork, Will knows it's hers because it's the violet file folder, his dads is green and his own is blue. Not that Will's has anything important in it, he keeps his important documents in a safety deposit box.

Dorothy's silent as she leafs through it and nods to herself, before fishing her keys from her purse and removing the house key. "This is better for all of us, I crossed a line last night and it's getting so hard to stop myself. I wish I could have been the mom you deserved, but I'm not, and I can't be. I'll find a lawyer and get things started, there's no point in drawing things out. I'll be in touch sometime." She looks at her husband and her son one last time before she gathers her cases and leaves them.

The door clicks behind her and just like that she's gone.


	18. Shirts

Ever since word got out about Quinn's pregnancy she's been spending a lot of time with Will, and that's totally fine, because she needs all the friends she's got, especially since Santana's aiming for Head Cheerleader now and she doesn't have Quinn's back.

Will does though and it's cool, but Finn really wishes he was involved in their bonding or comforting sessions, because she's his girlfriend. And yeah spending time with Will would be good, cos he's a really cool guy, and it has nothing to do with the fact that he's still kind of crushing hard on him.

It's mostly cos of Quinn though, and he doesn't like feeling left out.

It's like being bitch-slapped by a sticky iceberg. That's the first thought that hit's Finn after he confronts Karofsky and the whole damn hallway see's him dripping with grape slushie.

" _You two don't have the juice anymore."_

If it wasn't for Quinn he'd probably still be standing there, dripping on the floor watching as his popularity goes up in smoke, the last remnants of his status as top dog washed away on a tide of purple tinted ice and grape flavouring.

This is what it's like to be a loser, it sucks, and that fucking corn syrup burns the hell out of your eyes.

Quinn's ministrations with the towel don't seem to be helping much, he's sticky and it's gross, she just seems to be blotting it, he can barely see through the syrup in his eyes. Which sucks because he can't run through Bust a move, Puck won't and Will's doing it.

The view sucks because he can't see Will pulling out all the stops clearly, can't see the way his jeans hug his ass or the way his t-shirt moves as he dances or the crazy-happy grin on his face. Yet another reason that being Slushied sucks…

He has no idea why Quinn thought Miss Pillsbury of all people would help them claw back some measure of status, her suggestion of sunglasses is kind of cool, cos he could check out anyone and they'd never know for sure. The only thing cooler would be X-ray sunglasses so he could check people out naked. It'd be really cool to see Quinn naked, even though she's cut off all sexual contact, he still doesn't get what's up with that, she's pregnant and he's never actually had proper sex with her.

Ok so he's feeling a little cheated but come on he's a hormonal sixteen year old with a monumental case of blue balls. Not to mention a crush on a guy, and more than just idle curiosity about what said guy looks like completely naked…

He really wishes X-ray sunglasses existed.

The football team are dicks, how dare fucking Azimio tell him what plays to call, he's the fucking Quarterback and he's a damned good one, and these fucking losers won't shut the fuck up, fucking Azimio and his fat fucking mouth trying to make out like Quinn would cheat on him. He wishes Coach Tanaka hadn't dragged him off the fat fucker, he could have kicked the bastard's ass and shut him the hell up.

Then Coach blows up about Puck bailing for a glee thing and now he has to fucking choose?

Glee or football. Shit, what the fuck is he supposed to do now.

Football could be his ticket out of here, but Glee makes him happy. The guys on the team are assholes who rag on anyone for doing anything even remotely fucking different. Everyone in glee club, well they're not the best of friends but they look out for each other, they give a damn about each other.

But glee might not even get him out of Lima. Football's more likely to do that.

Fuck this is hard.

Did someone spike his soda at lunch or is Puck actually serenading Rachel? Hunh weird. Judging by the looks on Will and Kurt's faces they're not expecting it either.

Oh, he's trying to get into her pants, now it makes sense. There's not a lot he won't do to try and get laid. Here's hoping Rachel knows how to take care of herself, because Puck may be kind of a dick sometimes but he can charm the birds out of the trees and chicks out of their panties.

It's kind of a good news, bad news thing when Finn realises that Puck's almost as good a singer as he is, because at least if Puck chooses glee then the club won't be completely screwed. He knows it's a lame excuse or justification or whatever you call it, but it makes him feel a little better.

The sunglasses were a spectacular non-starter. He and Quinn get gang slushied by the whole damn team. It's like being bitch-slapped by a fucking blizzard this time. He's shell-shocked and shivering as someone leads him into a restroom, he has a vague recollection of Tina herding Quinn into the girls restroom, but he's just standing there dripping in the restroom, slushie soaking his shirts until he hears a voice.

"Strip." He orders Finn, and ok yeah he's had dreams like this but he's never thought anything like this would ever happen. Will's laying out a towel and a spare t-shirt of his along with his other supplies. Finn's still kind of shocky and not processing. "Dude?" He frowns.

"Your shirts are going to need to soak, grape is a bitch for staining, plus if you don't wash off the syrup you'll be sticky all day, so strip and wash off and I'll give your shirts a quick rinse. We'll get the syrup out of your hair and your eyes as well and there's a spare shirt for you there, it might be a little big on you but it'll do."

Finn blushes, right, Slushie clean up. That's all, because Will's just a nice guy and this isn't leading to some sort of porny bathroom moment. He turns away and peels off his shirts, because how can he compete with Will's hotness, it's just completely embarrassing and he feels kind of exposed. The syrup's kind of tough to wash off but he can see Will at the sinks rinsing his shirts, those strong, deft hands working to get the sticky crud out of his shirt."I dunno if I can handle this." He mutters. Will looks across from where he's soaking those shirts. He's got this searching, evaluating look on his face and Finn feels exposed emotionally as well as physically.

"Handle what?" Will asks, his voice is carefully neutral as he asks.

"Being Slushied, having to choose between football and glee. I-I don't want to be a loser Will, football's my ticket out of here, but I like singing. I don't know, what do I choose?" He cant help but huff in frustration, wishing the decision wasn't his, Will's good with decisions. Can't he just step in and take over this once? But Will just shrugs. Which isn't helpful, not one damned bit!

Finn groans as he dunks his head in the sink ,the cold water shifting the syrupy crud. He starts slightly when he feels Will's towel pressed into his hands. It's because he wasn't expecting it, not because he's bent over a sink and it would be so easy for Will's hands to just reach out and touch him. The words that follow bring him out of his reverie, his just-make-a-move-please-I-need-this fugue.

"It's your choice Finn. No one can make it for you." Will murmurs as he wrings out Finn's shirts. Finn peers at him from under the towel and sighs. "You're not helping." He whines. Would it kill him to help, to just step in, take over, make it better?

Will shrugs again before continuing. "That's because you have to do this one yourself. It's not my life, it's yours. Do what makes you happy. If it's football then it's football, if it's singing then it's singing, but it's your choice." Damn it, he can't just pin this on him, how the hell is he meant to make a decision like this?

Football is more likely to get him out of Lima, and he needs to get out. But Glee is one of the few damned things he's got that actually makes him feel worth a damn.

Finn slumps, defeated. Only for Will to tilt his head up and Finn knows his eyes are widening, because it would be so easy for Will to just close that distance and just kiss him already. But all he gets are eye drops, which sting a little. Will chuckles softly as Finn winces. "I know, it's kind of nasty, but it'll stop the burning. Your shirts are fine, they just need to dry."

He's still blinking to get the eye drops to settle when Will leaves with all his stuff, leaving him with a pair of damp t-shirts and one of his own. He's right, it is a little big on Finn, one of Will's pre-makeover t-shirts when he was in his baggy phase. It's that blue-marl colour and the cotton's soft against his skin. It even smells of Will.

He spends the rest of his day in Will's t-shirt, it's soft and smells good and when he's thinking his way through something in math or English he roll's the hem of the t-shirt in his fingers. It's kind of therapeutic, like a talisman, or those worry beads his mom has.

Matt, Mike and Puck choose glee.

For Kurt it was never even a choice, although announcing his departure in the showers might not have been the best option. So yeah, he needs to stick with football. And the glee club still have enough members for sectionals, it's a win-win situation, right?

It is.

It really is,

Besides he can still talk to Will when they study, right?

But if it's the best thing to do why does it hurt so much.?

Will doesn't show that night though. It's weird because Will's the one who's always insisting that they don't cancel without good reason. So if he's not here then he has to have a good reason. It's just that simple.

So Finn's alone and his mom's working and maybe it's a good thing that Will's not here because he's been thinking about him a lot, that second in the rest room the other day when he just wanted Will to kiss him, or touch him when he was bent over the sink. He's thinking about him like that a lot, when he should be thinking about Quinn, when he should be thinking about helping her out.

His thoughts whirl around inside his head as he lies on his bed and it's just too damn much! He rolls over and his arm flops off of the bed to the floor where his hand brushes against that t-shirt of Will's. He can't help picking it up and running the fabric through his hands, inhaling the faint scent of Will, it's all Cool Water and hair gel and unfamiliar fabric softener. It's evocative and soothing and he can't help thinking of the times he's seen this exact same t-shirt hanging from Will's waistband because it's soaked in his own sweat when he's beating the shit out of the heavy bag.

The visual sends a shudder of goosebumps across his skin and what feels like half of his blood supply to his dick. He moans as his jeans tighten and he has to unbutton and unzip them as quickly as he can because damn it he's so fucking hard and he's going to fucking chafe against the zipper at this rate.

In his mind he's back in the restroom with Will, but this time he's not bent over the sink, he's standing in front of the mirrors watching as Will's hands caress his chest, washing away the syrup covering him with warm soft cloths, cleaning him up. Taking care of him.

Because that's what he want's, it's what he needs. He needs someone to be there for him, someone who'll look after him with no agenda. He wants someone to love him just because he's him. Not because he's a quarterback or because he's the male lead. Someone who wants HIM.

Will's hands are opening his jeans now and Finn arches back against him, feeling the warmth and solidity of him behind him, eyes locked on those hands in the mirror that are caressing his dick, a warm solid grip that's just the right side of tight, a grip that morphs into long sure strokes and a flick of the wrist before it slides back down his cock again. Each stroke sending a shiver of yes, please, more, through him even as he feels Will's warm toned body pressed against his back.

He wants to turn around, he wants to see Will, wants to see those greenish grey eyes blown with lust. That happy grin of his when he's doing something he loves, those smooth pecs that he wants to lick, the abs that he wants to run his hands over for hours on end. He bites down on his lip in a futile effort not to come, cursing when he fails miserably and blows his load because fuck it he never even got to the good stuff. Not that he has any idea how big Will is because of those damned shorts of his being so goddamned baggy.

He opens his eyes and comes back to himself, jeans and boxers pushed down his thighs just enough so he can jerk off, his spent dick twitching slightly after his orgasm and the splotches of cum on Will's shirt, draped across his chest so he could smell him.

He groans in frustration and disappointment, not only did he blow his load early but he's jizzed all over Will's shirt and now he's going to have to try and do laundry and hope he doesn't trash the shirt, because there's no way he's handing it back covered in jizz.

Fuck his life.

Seriously.

He just wants to make it really clear that this was not his idea. He doesn't want to Slushie Kurt, cos he's a nice guy, once you get used to his icy bitch moments and the fact that he doesn't let anyone get close to him. He's kind of cool in a really Broadway obsessed way and he was really helpful with stuff like dry t-zones and skincare tips.

Not that he used most of them, but it's good to know this stuff just in case. So yeah, he really doesn't want to do this, he especially doesn't like the way Kurt's shutdown on him and acting like it's not a big thing, he hates the way Rachel's just written him off completely

Because it is a big thing, being Slushied is awful, it sucks, and the way everyone thinks he'd just abandon them so easily, like it wasn't one of the hardest decisions he had to make. Like it's not a damned knife thrust- like pain in the heart when he thinks about it. And damn it why can't anyone see that this hurts so damned much?

When Kurt takes the Slushie, he feels free but also awash with guilt, because it's out of his hands but Kurt's just going to toss it on himself and ruin his outfit. For him, for his reputation, to stop the guys on the team from kicking his ass which he deserves for being such a freaking jackass.

Only to be stopped by Will and fuck what happened to his face? That thought drowns out Will's speech, something about scarves and Kurt being a drama queen, just before he throws the Slushie over himself. It's like time slows down, as the slush splatters across him.

Finn can't speak, hell he can barely grab the cup once Will hands it to him. All he can hear is Kurt bitching at him. "Now get out of here, and take some time to think whether or not any of your friends on the football team would have done that for you."

He doesn't even have to think it. He knows the answer would be a big fat no. None of the guys on the team would do anything like that. But at least two of the guys in glee would.

He really screwed this up, didn't he?

Football may be his ticket out of Lima, but it's not a guarantee. Yes he gets kind of a thrill out of seeing his plays come to fruition, and it's great when they win, the one time it actually happened, but it doesn't make his heart thump and his blood burn like singing does, and Will was right, there are music scholarships and stuff.

He hates the fact that he had to choose at all, that some personal shit between his teachers intruded on his schooling, that even the adults who're supposed to look out for them and educate them can be stupid and petulant and bratty.

It's this whole feeling of unfairness and anger and helplessness that drives him to actually talk to Coach Tanaka. It could get him kicked off the team, or yelled at a lot at the very least, but he's the quarterback. How can he call the plays and lead if people won't let him?

It has to be worth a shot.

He never expected it to be that easy, especially since he kind of sucks at the whole wordy eloquence thing. He's not sure how he swung things, but given the look of guilt that passed across his face he's guessing the guy knows it was a dick move in the first place.

He still did it anyway. It sucks when you can't even trust your teachers to be all you know teachery.

Now all he needs to do is rejoin glee and he can deal with his crazy pregnant girlfriend and find out what's going on with Will and if he can help, and maybe try getting rid of this stupid crush on him. Because he really has to stop wanting to jump on top of him and get off. It's just not an option.

Maybe if he thinks like that it'll kill the crush.

Here's hoping.

Spending this much time in the gym can't be healthy right? Will's in there like a lot, and yeah he's hot, Finn's not gonna lie, or admit to how much he likes the view, but is it okay to spend like an hour and a half at the gym every day? Will looks kind of tense as he's working out, or maybe he's just tense because he's not alone, maybe he thinks someone's out to mess with him or something. It probably isn't the best idea to sneak up on someone who can floor you with one punch.

"Hey Will."

"Won't you get shunned for talking to me? Tanaka will make you run laps for breaking ranks." Ow ok, bitter much? Not that he doesn't have reason what with the whole quitting glee and the indirect Slushieing. So yeah the guy's kind of entitled to a little bitter.

Still, bitter or not he's going to finish this, he owes the guy that. "I talked to the Coach, he's going to scrap that Thursday practice. I told him I didn't want to choose, that I shouldn't have to. If I'm the quarterback I should be calling the plays and making my own choices. It's like you said, I should do what I want, what makes me happy. Kurt was right too, none of the other guys on the team would take a Slushie for me, hell for each other."

Hell, those assholes would probably join in just for kicks. Will gives him that look again, the one that feels like he's made of glass and every secret or thought he's ever had is right there for him to see. And given that he kind of jerked off to Will's shirt, well that's a particularly worrying thought. Thankfully Will's face softens before he speaks. "That's because most of the football team are morons with a tendency towards casual cruelty and the intellectual capabilities of a salt covered slug. I'm glad your making your own decisions Finn."

Yeah, he might be glad about it, but seriously decision making sucks! "Dude, decision making is like hard. Why do you think I asked you what to do? I'm terrified I'm going to fuck up. You're like one of the most together guys I know. Even if you did blow me off last night, seriously dude what happened to your face?"

Yeah he kind of sucks at the wordy eloquence thing because Will's face goes all impassive and he has to close his eyes and inhale before he moves on, so whatever it is, it's bad. . "It's personal. It's, I - I don't talk about this stuff with anyone other than Kurt. It's embarrassing and fucked up and dysfunctional and I just can't talk about it. Sorry I blew you off, but stuff happened, and it's kind of unresolved."

Okay that stings, that Kurt's the only one Will would talk about this with, it's kind of sad, bittersweet that he only has one person to talk about the serious shit with, it kind of makes Finn want to hug him and possibly never let go, but all he can do is nod sympathetically and say he gets it before he heads off to pick up Quinn.

But at least they're on better terms and he can rejoin glee on Monday, maybe he'll bring them all something as a Sorry-I-was-a-douche present.

Every other though leaves his mind when Quinn practically tackles him in the hallway, makeup trashed, her hair coming out of it's ponytail, sobbing incoherently and clinging onto him like he's the only thing stopping her from flying into the sky.

It takes fifteen minutes of her sobbing and him reassuring him that everything'll be okay before she calms down enough to scowl at him and cuss him out for being an idiot, because, "Nothing will be okay, Sue cut me from the Cheerio's and now I'm going to be that pregnant loser girl in glee club forever."

It's times like this when she lashes out at him that he wonders why he even wanted to date her in the first place, sure she's pretty and popular, but she's also shallow, vain, obsessed with status and has a cruel streak a mile wide.

But she's carrying his kid and they're stuck with each other. He's just going to have to suck it up and deal with it.


End file.
